From Russia With Not So Much Love
by Hadrianna
Summary: "I s-suggest…", Ryan managed to bring forth with a glance at Javi's unconscious frame, "…that you don't make your case any worse by actually killing a cop." He could see how the lips of his adversary curled into a smile, and he couldn't help but gulp. Seeing the villains smile was never a good thing, not in the movies and especially not in real life. Set after 3.12. M for torture.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I don't own Castle or any of its fantastic characters. That always seems to be the problem, doesn't it?

**From Russia with not-so-much love**

"Well, that's just odd…", Tomaz remarked as he looked at the large garden behind the house. "Are you sure that…", he began with a side glance at Samuel, but his partner cut him off with an annoyed gesture and held the cell phone up. Sure enough, the red dot was pointing to this exact spot. Only this exact spot consisted of a terrace with a small table, two chairs, a rather ugly water pitcher, and a large outdoor composting bin hidden behind an ocean of flowers. But no sign of Ms. Carrera who was the reason for their early morning trip to the Upper East Side. Weird.

"You think that thing is broken?", Sam asked after having taken the view in for a minute or two. The garden was beautiful with its symphony of red, violet and pink flowers, a secluded oasis shielded from the backyards of the other houses by thick, tall bushes, and sure wasn't something they saw too often in the middle of Manhattan. But they hadn't been called to this address to admire some petunias.

"Well…", Tomaz began and took the phone from his partner's hand, pointing it right in front of him. The technology used was still quite new and probably had its flaws, so he couldn't be too sure, but the distress signal had been real and it had come from Ms. Carrera's row house, so there was no reason to doubt the GPS' tracking abilities that had led them to the house and then to the adjacent garden. But from the terrace they could see the whole area and there sure as hell wasn't a person in sight. Unless… It _did_ point two meters to the right, but there was nothing there except the outdoor bin and that would have been… _Ah, to hell with it_, Tomaz thought and handed the device back to Samuel, before walking towards the composter with decisive strides. Maybe it was a joke, maybe the thing was actually malfunctioning, but he had a job to do and intended to fulfill it conscientiously, even if that meant looking at a bin with garden waste.

"What on earth are you doing, dude?", Sam called out to him as Tomaz made his way through the grass. He stopped in front of the composter, looking back at his colleague while lifting the lid slowly. "Just making sure we looked everyw-" The last word got stuck in his throat and turned into a shocked gasp as his eyes fell on the lifeless body at the bottom of the bin.


	2. Chapter 2

Kate could smell it in the hallway and there was no mistaking the source of that delicious odor. Her stomach growled in protest, a very persistent reminder of the fact that she hadn't had any breakfast yet. The cup of coffee that she had gotten on her way to Tribeca not counting, of course. With a sigh, she knocked on the door and waited ten, maybe twenty seconds until she saw exactly what she had been expecting after waking him with her call an hour ago: Castle, wearing a blue apron with the words _Kiss the cook_ stitched onto it in large, golden letters, a big, quite charming smile on his lips and a plate with an enticingly golden waffle in his right hand, complete with icing sugar, a melted marshmallow and chocolate spread. This guy had too much time on his hands and too many weird ideas in his head. Seriously.

"Gooooood morning to you", he said with that boyish grin of his and waved the plate in front of her nose teasingly. The smell was enough to let her stomach give another one of its dissatisfied rumbles, which Castle acknowledged with a "Somebody's hungry", but as much as she would have liked to taste that weird pile of sweetness, now wasn't the time. It was far too early for … well, whatever that was.

"Morning, Castle", she answered with a slight smile of her own and waved at Alexis, who was sitting at the kitchen counter with her head in a book and an untouched _waffle à la Castle_ next to her. "Ready for your daily dose of murder?"

She could have sworn that he lit up like a Christmas tree for a fraction of a second, but then his face turned serious and he grumbled: "And here I thought you came by because word had gotten out about my fantastic smoffles."

Smoffles… _Smoffles?!_ Sometimes she didn't know whether to kick or to hug him, so she decided to stay neutral as she had done so many times since they had begun working together (or what their unusual partnership could be called) and just shook her head. "Sorry, no … uhm… _smoffles_. But I still think you're going to enjoy this case. It has two shocked paramedics, an outdoor composting bin AND a GPS tracker." Castle's confusion was worth every second she had spent on preparing her entrance after she had gotten the call concerning the murder on the Upper East Side, and she savored the expression on his face for a few heartbeats longer than necessary. Long enough for Esposito to catch up with her and add in a dramatic tone of voice: "And a body. Not to forget the battered body of a young woman."

This time, the Christmas tree was unmistakable. "I'll be right with you", Castle promised, handed her the waffle and disappeared inside the apartment.

"Hey, is that a smoffle?", she heard Ryan's voice and turned around to face her colleague, who stared at Castle's creation with hungry eyes. Apparently she wasn't the only one who hadn't had time for breakfast.

"Help yourself", she replied with an inviting gesture and couldn't help but grin at Esposito's disgusted expression followed by a: "Dude, really? At seven in the morning?"

Ryan's: "_What?!_ I'm starving!" was almost unintelligible due to the large chunk of waffle… smoffle… in his mouth and actually made her chuckle. After everything they had been through, it was good to know that they could still make her day even at such an ungodly hour and on their way to a new murder scene.

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As they arrived at the address, the two paramedics who had made the call were already waiting for them. The one to the left couldn't have been at this job for too long judging by his young age, and considering that he was still shaking and pale as the moon after almost two hours had gone by, he probably wasn't that experienced either. The other one was older and had maybe three or four years on Kate, and he was not a happy camper. His expression was that of a man used to _do_ something – save lives, for instance – instead of sitting on a staircase with a cigarette in his hand and waiting. Maybe that was just his way of dealing with the macabre find, Kate mused as she approached the pair with Castle on her heels like a well-trained puppy. _One of these days I will have to teach him some tricks_.

"Good morning", she said with something she hoped would be regarded as an encouraging smile. "Are you the ones who…"

Kate didn't get to finish the sentence, because the older paramedic, _Grumpy_, interrupted her halfway with a sigh. "Yeah, that would be us. So could you _please_ ask us whatever you need to ask us, so we can get on with our job?"

Castle gave an almost inaudible snort and she exchanged quick looks with him. _No, I don't like this guy either. But we are professionals. Or at least I am_. She had no idea whether he understood any of the thoughts she was trying to convey through her gaze, but he didn't make any other sounds, so he probably got the message.

"Alright, Mr. … Isaacs, is that right?", she asked after checking out his name tag and offered him a hand. He took it without getting up, which seemed to hint either missing respect or an agitated state he was trying to hide.

"Call me Sam", he muttered after a few seconds. Then he looked at his partner and continued: "And that's Tomaz." Tomaz looked up at hearing his name and it wasn't hard for Kate to discover the deep shock inside his eyes. He opened his mouth as if to say something, but then seemed to decide otherwise and exchanged glances with Sam. "He's a little bit shaken. It's not every day we're called out to assist a heart patient in need and end up in the middle of a murder case."

Kate had gotten the details on their find through the phone, but she still liked to hear the story from the involved persons themselves, so she asked: "You said Ms. Carrera was a heart patient. How do you know this is a murder?"

At that, Tomaz made a sound that seemed to be a combination between a squeak and a grunt, before exclaiming: "Because heart patients normally don't break their bones and then climb into their own compost bins!"

"Ouch", Castle remarked and was echoed by Lanie, who had just been on her way out of the house and apparently had heard the last part of their conversation. "Ouch indeed", she repeated with a serious expression.

Kate directed her attention towards her friend and offered her a sip from her coffee mug, before asking: "What did you find?"

Lanie accepted the coffee with a thankful smile and pointed at the house, most likely meaning the garden behind it. "You better see for yourself, girl. But prepare yourself; it's not a pretty sight."

"Amen to that", Sam mumbled. Tomaz just stared blankly at the ambulance in front of them, making Kate wonder whether he would require psychological assistance. Finding a body was never easy, and even after solving countless murder cases, she had never really gotten used to the sight of eyes left lifeless and broken by the injustice that had been done to them. Before following Lanie, she knelt down in front of Tomaz and took his hand, trying to catch his gaze. When she didn't succeed, she pulled out a card from her wallet and handed it to him, placing it gently into his hand and closing his fingers around it.

"She's a good friend of mine, and she's a fantastic listener", she told him with a warm smile. Tomaz didn't answer, but Sam unexpectedly returned the smile and thanked her. _So just the shock then_, she thought and got up to follow Lanie and Castle into the garden. When she met Ryan on the way, who had been canvassing the neighborhood with his partner, she pointed at the two paramedics: "When they're ready, try and get the whole version of their story."

"You got it", he replied with one of his charming smiles. It wasn't hard to see why Jenny had fallen for him. "It might interest you that the neighbors didn't hear or see anything. Or if they did, they are not interested in sharing with the rest of the class. The old lady in the house next to Ms. Carrera said she had seen her get in at around ten last night and then got woken up by the sound of the ambulance."

That wasn't all that helpful, but then again – if solving a murder was easy, she would be out of a job. At least it narrowed down the timeline they would have to establish once they got back to the precinct. "Thanks, Kevin", she acknowledged his information and hurried up to catch up with the other two, who by now had made their way through the impressively beautiful garden and had come to a stop at the compost bin Tomaz had been talking about. The lid had been lifted off and both of them were staring at its contents; judging by the greenish look on Castle's face, he by now regretted both the smoffles and not to have heeded Lanie's warning. But he wouldn't have been Castle, if he didn't have a comment on the ready for her despite the gruesome sight, because once she had reached them and taken the murder scene in, he muttered with a weak grin: "Bet the city's _waste not_ initiative never thought about putting the word "body" on the _What not to throw into your compost bin_ sign."

"Very funny, Castle", Kate retorted with a snort before looking down at the victim once more. Oh, the poor woman. She was thankful for her friend's warning, which had allowed her to prepare herself just a little bit for what waited down there. The container wasn't big enough to hold a body in its natural size, so somebody had helped the situation along by … _folding_ … the body to match the bin, breaking arms, legs and apparently the neck too on the way. Her face, framed by blood-clotted, black hair, was almost not to recognize due to large, almost black bruises and quite an amount of blood stemming from her mouth and the broken nose. The eyes were swollen shut, and her throat had been cut, leaving a deep, dark gap. Ugh.

"The limbs, were they…", Kate began with a side glance at Lanie, but her friend shook her head.

"They were broken post mortem. Without getting her out of there, I can't be completely sure, but I would say the bruises stem from a brutal beating that she took before being murdered. Then somebody used a knife – a really large one, with saw teeth, see the ripped lines here – to work on her throat, which probably killed her."

"And nobody heard a thing. Sure", Kate sighed. Well, what did she expect? This was New York after all.

"What do we know about her?", Castle asked – probably to distract her, if she knew him right. She was thankful for the change of subject and explained readily while looking at a file she had been carrying: "Her name is Nina Carrera, and she's… she was thirty-six. I couldn't find that much about her; the hospital provided me with her file. She suffered from bradycardia, that's why she had been implanted with a pacemaker – one of the newest models with built-in GPS technology that is activated once the pulse gets too low. Says here she was part of a trial group to see by how much the GPS tracker would shorten the time to respond to a distress call. There's nothing in here about her current occupation, but she has listed her cousin, a certain Lila Jensen, as her emergency contact." After she had finished, she looked at Castle expectantly: "So, any wild theories?"

"Well", he answered with a gaze back at the container. "It's possible somebody wanted to teach her a valuable lesson about recycling…"

Esposito joined them, coming out of the house with a note block in his hands. "But why then would the killer turn her house upside down?", he asked in reference to Castle's random shot. "Looks like a tornado went through there."

Kate glanced back at the composter and pondered for a moment about this new information before saying: "So our killer was looking for something. And he … or she…"

"Oh, with the way the bones were broken, we're definitely talking a he", Lanie helped out.

"Or one of those Eastern European female body builders", Castle added. "You know, the ones that fill themselves with testosterone to…"

"Yes, yes, we know about them, Castle", Kate hurried to interrupt and continued her musings: "So _he_ was looking for something and decided to _ask_ Ms. Carrera in a not so polite manner. When she didn't tell him about the object's whereabouts, he decided there was no further use for her and got rid of her, trying to make sure nobody would find her body. Even if somebody reported her missing, who would look inside a compost bin in an untouched garden?"

"But", Castle jumped in with a pensive expression, "the killer didn't know about her heart problems or the GPS tracker, so the question is – did he actually find whatever he was looking for before our paramedics showed up unexpectedly?"

"How about we let CSU deal with that question, while we invite Ms. Jensen to a little trip to our nice precinct?", Esposito suggested with a nod at Kate's file.

"Sounds like a plan", Kate agreed and closed the file. "See what you can find out about Ms. Carrera's time of death once CSU has swept the garden", she then said directed to Lanie before turning on her heel and walking back to the car with a deep sigh. _Just another day in the old town_.


	3. Chapter 3

Ms. Jensen had seemed both confused and nervous when she had opened the door, and Ryan had made a note on her behavior once they had escorted her to the car and Esposito had gotten behind the wheel. But she had cooperated fully and accepted his "Detective Beckett will explain the situation to you shortly" with only a mild expression of impatience. When he had offered her a cup of coffee, she had accepted it with a thankful smile, and once he had left the interrogation room, she had put all of her attention towards the cup and taken a small sip.

"My hunch says she has no idea what's going on", he offered as he closed the door behind him and was met by Esposito.

"Dude, we haven't even heard her story yet", his partner replied with a sly grin.

Ryan looked back at the twenty-five year old brunette, now staring with an expression of utter confusion into her coffee. No way did she have anything to do with this case, but he did agree that maybe she could point them in the right direction. If she was listed as an emergency contact, she probably knew quite a deal about what had been going on in Nina Carrera's life prior to her death – if she had had any enemy's, what she could have been hiding that was important enough to kill, anything of interest really.

"Good morning, boys", Ryan heard a familiar voice coming from behind them, and as he turned around, his gaze met Lara's, one of the secretaries working at the 12th. She was almost as tall as him, with a physique that probably made a lot of the other women at the precinct jealous. Her raven black hair was hanging straight and loosely all the way down to her shoulders and framed a slender, elegant face with sea-green eyes that sparkled like emeralds in the morning sun. In her left hand, she held a stack of paper, while her right hand was clutched around a coffee mug that she was handing to Ryan once he greeted her back with a "Morning, Lara".

"Coffee?", she asked with a dazzling smile that would have been enough to make his knees turn to jelly if it hadn't been for the fantastic woman back home that had agreed to marry him. Considering that he had proposed in the middle of the precinct during work hours, it was impossible for Lara _not_ to know about their impending wedding, but that didn't stop her from flirting with him at each opportunity. Or at least he guessed that that was what she was doing. Esposito gave him a meaningful look as he took the cup from her hands and said with a smile: "Thanks. You're too good to me, Lara". She beamed at him and went on her way and he turned around to face his partner with a "I haven't had my coffee yet!".

He swore he could hear Esposito think _That's why Castle gave us a coffee machine_, but what he actually did was just to roll his eyes while he made his way back to his desk. Ryan took a sip of the coffee – sugar and cream, Lara knew him well – and followed his partner with a last glance at Ms. Jensen. Beckett was just about to enter the interrogation room, and he could see how a flinch went through the young woman's body – probably because Beckett had opened the conversation by telling her about Nina Carrera. Poor girl.

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"Nina… Nina's dead?", Lila asked with tears in her eyes. "But that's impossible! I just talked to her yesterday at the café – how can she be dead?"

Kate tried to catch the woman's gaze and to hold it firmly, but Lila kept switching between her, the cup between her snow-white hands and Castle, who for once wore an earnest expression on his rugged features. If there was one thing she really liked about him, it was that he knew when to be serious… well, most of the time anyways.

"Lila, I know this is difficult for you, but I will have to show you a picture so you can help me identify Ms. Carrera… Nina…" Kate opened the file in front of her that by now had grown larger with pictures from the crime scene and the victim. The first one was of Nina Carrera lying on an autopsy table, and though it wasn't as horrific as the position they had first found her in, it was still a sight to make her stomach churn. It would be hard for Lila to look at, and she prepared herself to offer the necessary comfort to talk Ms. Carrera's cousin through this. When she finally managed to procure Lila's attention, she pushed the photograph towards her with slender fingers and awaited her reaction. A gasp and a lot more tears told her all she needed to know before Lila even said a single word, and her next sentence was almost drowned out by her sobs. "Yes… yes, that's Nina. Oh God, what happened to her? Who did this? Why…?"

"That's what we're trying to find out, Lila", Kate answered calmly and took the photo from her. "And we were hoping that maybe you could shed some light on all of this. According to the hospital, you were Ms. Carrera's emergency contact, so…" She let her words trail off in hopes that Lila would continue on her own, and she didn't have to wait long. Though she had directed her gaze back into the by now almost empty cup, she nodded and whispered through tears: "I… I'm not sure I can… be of any help, but… of course… She… We… We were very close, but I don't think I can be of much help."

"If you could just tell me a little bit about her, that would already be a great help. We couldn't find that much on her", Kate offered a possible beginning for Lila, and she took the hint with a weak smile. "There's… there's not much to tell, really. Nina was a very quiet woman, she didn't let many people in."

"What did she do for a living?", Castle butted into the interrogation – he did know the routine by now and so Kate didn't comment on his interference.

"She… she worked as a housekeeper in Old Westbury at the… oh, I think it was called the… the Wellerby residence…" Lila looked up as if awaiting an acknowledgement from Kate and Castle, and once again Castle managed to surprise when he scratched himself under the chin and replied in that _Behold-I-The-Mighty-Castle-Know-Everything-_voice she had learned to both appreciate and hate: "Ah, Martin and Richard's place."

Kate knew that he wanted her to play along, so she asked dutifully: "You know them?"

Castle smirked. "Well, I know _of_ them, but I haven't had the pleasure of meeting them yet. They're the heirs of multimillionaire Alexander Wellerby, who tragically died of cancer last year and left them with quite an impressive estate in the form of his shipping empire."

His words _did_ ring a bell, but considering that they lived in Long Island, it wasn't surprising that she hadn't remembered the name; it wasn't exactly her neighborhood, neither for a living nor in connection to her job, and though she did keep herself updated by reading the New York Times daily, the financial section didn't interest her all that much.

"Yes, exactly", Lila confirmed with a nod. "But I think she quit, or at least she told me she was looking for a new job."

Kate exchanged a quick look with Castle and knew exactly that they were thinking the same thing. Maybe Nina had seen or heard something that she hadn't been supposed to see or hear. "Do you know _why_ she had to find a new job?", Kate asked in an innocent tone of voice.

"Uhm… no, not really. She had said something about moving, but… no, I don't know", she concluded with an audible finality to her tone of voice.

Kate wasn't sure whether Lila was telling her the whole truth, but she had made it clear that she wouldn't continue down that path, so Kate changed the course of the conversation: "Did she have any enemies that you know of? People who were angry at her?"

For a second, maybe just a heartbeat, Kate thought she saw something in Lila's eyes – just a flicker of an emotion, but it was gone too soon to tell the meaning behind it. Then the brunette said: "No… no one I can think of. As I said, Nina was very quiet and got along well with everybody. You don't think somebody who knew her did this?!"

Kate decided to play another one of her cards and found a photo from the living room that made clear just how much the killer had known Nina Carrera: "The man who murdered your cousin was searching for something. It wasn't just a robbery – we found a lot of her valuables still in place. Furthermore, the front door hadn't been broken open, which means that Ms. Carrera let the killer into her house willingly. Ergo she had to know him. Can you think of anything he could have been after, Lila? Anything at all?"

At that, Lila looked truly confused and seemed to think really hard about the question, but once again she ended a part of the interrogation with a shake of her head and the words: "No. Nothing comes to mind. I am sorry I can't be of more help." She actually did look sorry, but Kate hadn't forgotten about the emotion that had surfaced for the fraction of a second. _Mental note to self: Dig deeper if the Wellerby-lead turns out to lead to nowhere_.

"Don't be – we are thankful for every bit of information we can get, so thank you for your cooperation, Lila. And if anything else comes to mind, don't hesitate to call me, okay?" Kate handed Lila her card and gave her an encouraging smile that was returned meekly. "I will, Detective Beckett."

Somehow, Kate didn't believe her.

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"My, my", Esposito exclaimed after they had sent Lila Jensen home with a cab. "So Martin and Richard Wellerby – that's quite an impressive clientele."

Ryan made a sound of agreement, but didn't take his eyes of the photos CSU had made of the crime scene. He knew that each detail could be the one thing shedding more light on this case, and so he took his time to take the scenery in attentively. Every single room had been rampaged by the killer; drawers had been pulled out and thrown on the floor, cupboards had been opened and stripped of their insides, even the carpet had been lifted in places, which hinted that whatever the killer had been looking for was quite slim and easy to hide. Tables and chairs had been turned upside down, the mattresses in the bedroom had been sliced open, pictures had been torn from the walls… How on earth none of the neighbors had heard something still made him wonder and made another explanation quite more likely: No one cared. Ryan took a look at the next photograph, this one of the study. The chaos was the same, but he did notice a calendar still lying seemingly untouched in the middle of her desk, though it was impossible to read the entries on the picture. Maybe she had met with someone in the last few days who could tell them more about the circumstances surrounding her death, he pondered while already grabbing the car keys. "Wanna go for a ride?", he asked Esposito, but didn't wait for an answer – of course his partner would follow him on a possible lead.

As he explained his idea to Beckett, he noticed Castle reading articles on the Wellerby's at her computer, but he only registered the headlines: "End of an era – goodbye to Alexander Wellerby", "Martin & Richard – taking over the family business", "Wellerby investment a faux pas". Apparently, Martin and Richard had some problems of their own right now… Though whether there was any connection to their case was left to be seen.

"You do that", Kate answered: "Castle and I are going to check out her job story."

"Time for visiting the rich and famous", Castle agreed with a smirk and added while pointing at the last headline: "Or should I say the once rich and famous?"

It wasn't the most trustworthy of newspapers (not to say the least trustworthy), but a sentence like "On collision course: Wellerby-brothers gambling away family fortune in Eastern Europe" _did_ probably sell quite nicely.


	4. Chapter 4

Though their monetary problems seemed to be well-known in the financial world, the giant mansion in the European Jugendstil, the art nouveaux, with the enormous park in front of it, complete with high, white-chalked walls, an iron portal and a flaming red Porsche in the driveway, still told the story of life in high society. As Kate risked a side glance at her companion, it was easy to see Castle's dreamy expression.

"I'm sure they'll be more than happy to sell it to you", she joked as she drove the car through the open gate and parked it next to the red racer, where it looked a lot more plump than usual.

"Yeah…", Castle just replied hesitantly; she wasn't sure he had even heard a word she had just said. "That _is_ a nice house, isn't it?"

"It's a nice _palace_", she retorted. Even if she made it to chief, there was no way she could ever pay something like that on her salary, so even _if_ she had taken it to her liking (which she didn't – far too pompous!), there was no way she would ever be able to actually buy it. Again Castle just made a distant sound, but at least he got out of the car when she left the Crown Vic as well.

Their arrival should have been unexpected, but before they could even reach the massive staircase that led up to the double winged door, a man of thirty, maybe thirty-five came down the stairs in quite a hurry. When he noticed the newcomers, he stopped dead in his tracks and stared at them in a mixture of surprise and annoyance, and the latter definitely won when Kate pulled out her badge and said in a firm voice: "Martin Wellerby? NYPD. I would like to ask you a few questions about Nina Carrera."

Even if she hadn't imprinted the brothers' pictures, there would have been no mistaking the man in front of her. Martin Wellerby was just as good-looking in real life with tightly cut, blond hair, ice blue eyes and a rugged, yet quite handsome face. Almost a head higher than her, he was casually clad in navy blue jeans, a brown leather jacket and a tight black shirt that didn't leave much to her imagination. Well, he probably did have a lot of spare time on his hands that he could spend at the gym. He would probably look even nicer with a smile on his lips, but all she got right now was a brow raised in surprise and a confused: "Ah… sorry… _what_?"

Kate had met enough people in her life to know when someone wasn't being quite honest, and Martin's surprised reaction was totally fake. Castle seemed to agree with her, judging by the smile that kept growing on his lips, but even though the younger Wellerby brother wasn't all that surprised as he would have wanted them to believe, that didn't mean they had already found their culprit. If there was another thing she had learned well during her years in the force, it was not to act too rashly on a possible lead.

"Your housekeeper", she explained. "That was her job with you, wasn't it?"

The fake confusion turned into something that might or might not have been fake worry – it was actually a lot harder to tell this time. "Yes, she was", Martin admitted.

"_Was_", Castle whispered into her ear in a playfully high-pitched voice.

"I heard him", Kate whispered back and followed up on his statement by asking: "What do you mean, she was?"

The confusion that spread on Martin's handsome features was most certainly not a bluff, of that she was sure: "What do you think I meant? I meant that we had to fire her last week. She was a lying, stealing b-i-t-c-h and she can count her blessings that we didn't report her to the police for theft! So if she sent you as some kind of revenge…"

There was no need to let him go on, so Kate interrupted him with a not-so-polite gesture: "She didn't _send_ us, Mr. Wellerby, not personally at least."

That didn't stop Martin – apparently he didn't really get what Kate was trying to say. "So she engaged a lawyer, has she? That little…"

"Mr. Wellerby", Kate tried again with a deliberate sharpness in her tone of voice. "As far as I know, Ms. Carrera did not engage a lawyer."

"Then why…", Martin began, and Kate was just about to tell him about Nina's murder, when the older brother, Richard, entered the staircase and looked at the scene with a lot more distrust than Martin had displayed. He was in his early forties and handsome in a more elegant, sophisticated way; whereas Martin seemed to prefer a more relaxed jeans look, Richard was dressed in a black suit with a blood-red tie, shining black shoes and shoulder-long, dyed black hair that matched his moustache. The only similarity between the brothers were the facial features and the light blue eyes that now seemed to bore directly into Kate's mind. It made her shudder. A look at Castle told her that he seemed to be quite impressed by Richard's appearance and his fingers seemed to wander on their own to his upper lip as if he pondered whether a moustache would suit him as well as the older Wellerby.

"Would you care to tell me what this is concerning?", Richard asked in a deep, full voice. He never took her eyes of her, and he didn't even blink when she raised her badge and explained who she was. "And this is concerning Nina Carrera's murder", she said in as professional a tone as she could muster in this man's presence. She would not let herself be intimidated by him, no way.

And as it seemed, she had just done a bit of intimidating herself, she thought with an inner smile as Martin and Richard exchanged shocked looks and beckoned her and Castle to come inside.

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The house had looked exactly the same as on the pictures, which had made it easy for Ryan and his partner to procure the calendar. Most days had been empty and as far as they could see there was no valuable information concerning her murder, but each Thursday at five p.m., the entry had read "Sarah" with a different coffee shop underneath. Today was to be Chris' Coffee.

"Coffee break?", Esposito had asked with a grin and pointed at his watch – four thirty p.m. and according to the address, Chris' Coffee was just around the corner. "I have a hunch that Nina didn't cancel that meeting."

Ryan had had to agree – considering that a murder probably wasn't something anyone would be expecting, there was a fair chance that Sarah would be there in half an hour, so he had returned the smile with a "Yeah, I could use another coffee" and taken another look around the house. Nope, nothing he hadn't seen on the photographs.

They had entered Chris' Coffee shop with ten minutes to spare and found a place close by the door from where they could watch all customers that left or entered, ordered two large coffees and waited. The place was small and quite cozy, with small sofa groups in different colors, flowers on the tables and walls in a rustic design. And there were pillows everywhere with different motives. Jenny would have loved this place, especially considering that they sold about fifty kinds of tea.

"Does she look like a Sarah to you?", Esposito interrupted his thoughts and he looked from the roses on the table in front of him to the door, where a woman in her mid-thirties had just entered and now looked around as if searching for someone. She was wearing an elegant, beige dress that reached down to her knees with a thin, red belt at her waist, high heels in matching colors and red hair that was braided all the way down to her back. A black leather case was clutched under her arm and she was just pushing a pair of expensive, black sunglasses up into her hair.

"Why don't you ask her?", Ryan suggested as she walked right by them and made her way to the bar. She must have heard him, because she hadn't even made it half way, when she turned around and said with a smile that radiated a lot of self-confidence: "Yes, I have a boyfriend, no, I won't let you buy me a cup of coffee, but I do thank you for your attention."

Ryan could feel how his face went bright red and he tried to explain, but all he managed to stammer was something that sounded unintelligible to his own ears, so there was absolutely no way she could have understood him. Esposito's mischievous grin sure as hell didn't help, but at least his partner defused the situation by saying: "That wasn't our question, actually, but thanks for the info."

The woman looked completely taken aback, but she was a whole lot faster at regaining her poise. "Oh, I am sorry… I just assumed… Then what…?"

"We were just wondering if your name is Sarah and whether you were going to meet with Nina Carrera?", Ryan finally managed to ask in a coherent sentence. When a deep crease appeared between her eyebrows and the air around her grew a few degrees colder, he knew that he had guessed correctly, so he pulled his badge from his jacket and explained in a calm tone of voice: "Detective Ryan, NYPD. We…"

She didn't let him finish; instead she asked with a clearly audible concern in her voice: "Oh my God… Is she… Is Nina alright?"

Ryan exchanged looks with Esposito; this was never an easy part. "I am sorry…", he began and was interrupted once more, when she exclaimed: "Oh God, what… what happened?"

It took Ryan a few seconds to gather himself, and he was thankful when Esposito hurried to say: "She was found dead this morning."

For a second, Sarah was completely silent as if she was trying to process the information she had just gotten. Then she whispered very quietly: "So her heart finally gave in…"

"Unfortunately, it's not as easy as that. She was murdered and…", Ryan explained and this time he stopped by himself when he read her body language that clearly told him that she was going to interrupt him again.

"M-murdered?" Her voice was shaking by now and she slumped down next to Ryan as if every grain of strength had left her body. The air of self-confidence that had encompassed her like an invisible veil was completely gone by now. "But… but how? Why?"

"That's what we're trying to find out", Esposito answered much like Beckett had begun her conversation with Lila – they all knew the drill, the right order to ask questions, to introduce new and to dig for further information. "And as you were listed in her calendar for today, we were hoping that you might help us shed some light on this case."

Sarah nodded slowly and switched from looking at Esposito at Ryan and back to his partner.

"When you last met with her, did she tell you anything that might be of relevance? Anything you can think of?", Ryan wanted to know, but this time, Sarah shook her head. "No… no, I don't… I don't think so. She had just lost her job and was really anxious, but who wouldn't be in an economy like this? She had a mortgage to pay, after all, so I just… I tried to soothe her, told her that with her qualifications of course she would find something, and then she called me the next day and said I had been right and she was so excited and thanked me for my support. But I hadn't heard from her since and was really… really looking forward to…" At that, Sarah began to sob and her last words were impossible to understand, but their meaning was clear nonetheless. Ryan found a tissue and offered it to her, and she accepted it with the hint of a smile.

"Do you know why she lost her job?", Esposito continued when she had blown her nose and dried her tears.

She hesitated for a second, then muttered: "I don't… I don't think I'm supposed to…"

"It's alright, Sarah", Ryan encouraged her. "If it might have any relevance at all, please share it with us."

Sarah sighed deeply. "I guess… I guess it doesn't matter anymore, now… Oh God, I still can't believe she's… Ah, sorry… What happened was that her boss, Martin Wellerby, accused her of stealing, completely out of the blue. She has worked for the Wellerby's for years and always done her job well, and then all of a sudden … Nina would never do that! She would never take something that isn't hers!"

Not under normal circumstances, maybe, Ryan thought after hearing her story. But maybe if… "Sarah, do you know if Nina had any financial troubles?"

For just a flicker of a second, the whiff of arrogance was back and Sarah explained in a more harsh tone of voice: "I know what you're getting at, Detective, but even with… even _if_ she had been in trouble, she wouldn't steal. Not Nina."

The slight shudder in her voice certainly didn't escape Ryan, but it was apparent that Sarah didn't want to talk more about the issue, so he returned to the checklist of questions and asked: "Do you know of anyone who would have wanted to hurt Nina, then? Anyone who was angry at her?"

It took Sarah a while to think about the question, and Ryan was already losing any hope of new information that could help them, when Sarah's face suddenly turned dark. "Lila… Lila, that crazy b…" She didn't finish her sentence, but again the meaning was quite clear and Ryan showed her with a nod that he wanted her to go on. "Lila was furious when Nina suddenly started dating Christopher. She went completely nuts and started to threaten her for stealing her boyfriend. Anonymous calls at night, and a big fight at that coffee bar last Wednesday – but Nina only mentioned it briefly because of her troubles at the Wellerby's, so I didn't think much of it."

Bingo. So Lila _had_ been lying, even though Ryan still had a hard time imagining that petite brunette committing murder. Especially after Lanie had concluded that whoever had beaten Nina and broken her bones had been quite strong. But it was a lead and he decided to follow up on it.

"And does Christopher have a last name?", Esposito asked, apparently coming to the same conclusion.


	5. Chapter 5

"So our little thief got what she deserved", Richard Wellerby said in a voice as cold as ice. Martin actually looked quite shocked at his brother's statement and hit him in the side with his elbow, but Richard didn't as much as blink.

"What could she possibly have stolen that would warrant a murder?", Castle asked in a tone of genuine curiosity. After spending a long time on admiring the interior of the house, he had finally decided to join the conversation and the brothers had asked them to sit down on a large, black leather couch in front of a stylish fireplace. A young woman, not much older than Nina, had come in at one point to serve them something to drink, and Beckett had used the first five minutes to explain, how Nina Carrera had been found, while showing the Wellerby's pictures to underline the seriousness of the situation. Richard's emotionless comment didn't make her any less suspicious, for sure.

"Family heirlooms", Martin hurried to explain before his brother could even open his mouth. "When I discovered that they had gone missing, I did some digging, and every clue led to her. Last week I confronted her with the results of my investigation and she started crying and said she owed someone a lot of money and didn't have any other choice and …"

"… and boohoo", Richard remarked. "Yeah, really tragic. We told her we wouldn't go to the police, if she just returned the items to us, and so she did and then we fired her. End of story."

"Apparently not quite the end", Kate replied with a gesture at the pictures of Nina in the composting bin.

"Careful now", Richard commented in a very calm and silent and somehow dangerous tone of voice. "Are you accusing us – _us!_ – of murder, Detective Beckett?"

Yes, she was, but she couldn't admit that to the brothers without any evidence that connected them to the murder scene. Maybe she was too quick to judge, too, but that older brother didn't make it easy to stay unprejudiced. "I am just stating that something happened after she took your… heirlooms", she began, but was instantly interrupted by Richard: "Yes – and if I were you, I would look a little bit closer at that important piece of information my brother just gave you."

"That she was owing money to someone and was desperate?", Castle muttered in an obvious attempt to calm things down. "Did she say a name?"

Richard just gave a huff, but Martin shook his head and explained in a much more forthcoming tone of voice: "No, but I think she was afraid."

Kate felt like snorting in derision (the woman had been _murdered_, of course she had been afraid!), but she managed to keep her face as professional as possible, made a note in her journal and said: "Is there anything else you could tell me about Ms. Carrera? Anything that might be relevant?"

"Yes", Richard Wellerby replied in that cold voice of his that made Kate shudder inside. "If you should indeed catch her murderer, please let me know so I can pay his lawyer."

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"Of course I was angry!", Lila shouted after Ryan had presented her with Sarah's side of the story. She hadn't been all that happy to return to the station in the first place and the mentioning of her ex-boyfriend didn't do anything to make the situation any better. On the contrary. "You would be too! I introduced them to each other, it was _my_ party – and then they just leave together!" When neither Ryan nor Esposito said anything in return, she took a few deep breaths and said in a more calm voice: "But that didn't mean I wanted her dead."

"According to our witness, you threatened Nina", Esposito remarked. "Considering that she is dead now and you failed to mention any of this at your first visit, I'd say that sounds like you were trying to cover up a motive."

The tears dwelled up again and Lila's face turned an even redder shade than before. "I… I would never… she was my friend…" Then she seemed to think of something, because her anger returned as quickly as it had waned and she yelled: "Hey, who told you this anyways?!"

"That's not -", Ryan gave back, but found himself interrupted for the umpteenth time that day, when Lila thundered on: "It _is_, if that person is trying to lead you onto a false track! And if _that person_ is Sarah Murdock, then _maybe_ you two clowns should dig a little bit deeper and ask dear _Sarah_ about _her_ motive."

Clowns. Wow. What had happened to that sweet, shy brunette from this morning who had promised full cooperation? But considering that she had guessed right, there was probably another lead hidden here that they should investigate, so Ryan swallowed any grim comment that had been lying on his tongue and went on: "_Her_ motive?"

"And not to forget Christopher – I know he wasn't too happy with how Nina had behaved towards me after the break-up. So how's _that_ for me helping you out?", Lila snarled and underlined her fury with a loud _bang_ as she hit the table with her fist.

Ryan could hear Esposito sigh deeply, but as unpleasant as Lila might be at the moment, she had presented them with a lot of missing details, so he decided to stay as polite as possible and said with a nod: "Thank you, Lila. But we still need to know where you were last night between ten p.m. and five a.m.?".

It was obvious that she was very dissatisfied with having to present an alibi, but she did so nonetheless: "At home. Having fun. As Carl can assure you."

Esposito looked up in surprise, and Ryan couldn't help but think _That was quick_ himself. "Carl?", he followed up on her words.

The real reason for her dissatisfaction with having to present an alibi became clear as she answered in a much more hushed voice: "My neighbor's husband. And I would appreciate it if you didn't tell her about us."

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"Good thing this case isn't complicated", Kate sighed as they stood in front of the murder board that had filled up quite quickly during half a day's investigation. On top, a photograph of Nina Carrera had been placed, from which arrows led to the Wellerby's, Lila Jensen, Sarah Murdock and Christopher Warren, whom they had yet to establish contact with.

"And it gets better", she heard Lara's voice emerging from behind her. The secretary was carrying a small stack of paper and handed it to Ryan with an expectant expression. Seriously, how could she still not know…?, Kate wondered briefly, but then her curiosity got the best of her and she asked: "What's that?"

"Nina's financials", Ryan explained as he flicked through the documents. When he noticed that Lara was still standing in front of him, he smiled at her, though it seemed to be a forced expression. "Thanks", he said and sighed in relief as she wandered off. One of these days, he would have to tell her, Kate thought, but that would have to wait until they had solved this case. With two quick steps, she was at his side and discovered within an instant what Lara had meant. There were three different accounts and all of them were in the red. In the last few weeks, large amounts of cash had been withdrawn, until all three accounts had been maxed out. So the Wellerby's hadn't exaggerated when they had told them about the trouble their housekeeper had been having. The only thing going in had been the salary from Martin and Richard, so if she had indeed lent money from someone, it had been off the records.

"Did CSU find anything else that might have something do to with her financials?", Kate asked after having reviewed all three accounts in detail.

"Let's find out", Esposito suggested and went for the phone. Castle looked at the figures on the paper and whistled appreciatively at a few of them. "5,000 Dollars withdrawn a week before her death, 3,000 before that. I wonder what our dear Nina was up to?"

"I think I know what Lila meant when she said Sarah had a motive", she heard Esposito say after his call to CSU. "They found a book of household accounts that Nina had kept, and guess whom she borrowed quite a fair amount of money from?"

Kate sighed. So another one who hadn't been quite honest. "We better talk to her again. Where are we on that Warren guy?"

"Christopher Warren", Ryan muttered while looking through a few sheets of paper. "Holds a degree in international economics from Kingston University, London, and has worked for different shipping companies in Europe and the U.S. the last fifteen years. His last position was with the Eastern Gold Starline shipping company in Poland, but when I contacted them, they told me he had just quit his job. I couldn't find any address, but maybe Lila can help us out with where he was staying in New York."

Kate nodded and turned back to Esposito when she heard him clear his throat. "The household account isn't the only thing interesting CSU found. There were long, blonde hairs in a brush found in the bathroom."

Blonde… Blonde?! Kate's eyes found the murder board just to make sure she didn't remember incorrectly: Sure enough, Nina's hair was long, but with its dark black, almost blue shade it was as far from blonde as possible.

"Let them run a DNA test", she suggested, though she didn't have too high hopes concerning the results. With another long glance at the board that didn't give her any more answers, she whispered distantly: "What _were_ you up to, Nina?".

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"I was surprised to get your call, Detective", Sarah said as she shook Kate's hand and followed her and Castle into the interrogation room. "I tried to think of something I might have missed about Nina, but …"

Kate waited for her to finish, then gave her a polite smile and sat down opposite of her. On the table, she had already placed Nina's financials quite visibly, and it didn't take Sarah long to get the gist. "Oh", she remarked after almost a whole minute spent in silence.

Though that usually did the trick, Kate was still amazed at how effective the silent treatment could be. "Is there anything else you would like to tell me, Ms. Murdock?", she followed up on Sarah's suddenly nervous expression. "Maybe why you failed to mention to my boys that Nina owed you a lot of money? And we are talking _a lot_!" To underline her statement, Kate pulled out the book of household accounts and opened the first page, where Sarah's name had been written in a neat handwriting with several dates and amounts below. "Januar 14th, 1,500 Dollars. February 26th, 2,000 Dollars. March 20th, 1,500 Dollars. And not to forget June 1th, 10,000 Dollars. Nina owed you the neat amount of 25,000 Dollars, Ms. Murdock. And considering the state her bank accounts were in, I don't think she was able to pay you back any time soon. And you don't think that would have been prudent to mention?"

The color on Sarah's face turned from pale to snow-white. "I… Let me explain. It's… it's true, I had lent her that money when she asked me, but … but when those two Detectives showed up and told me that she had been murdered, I just lost my nerves! I mean… I know how that looks, I watch C.S.I. too! Suddenly I had a motive and … and …" The last words were almost impossible to understand, but Kate had heard them so many times before that they didn't need to be articulated completely. Furthermore, she was sure this woman wasn't bluffing at all, but she would still have to ask the next question:

"Where were you last night, Ms. Murdock?"

Sarah looked up, still visibly shaken: "I… I was working late. I work at a law firm, Hutchin's and Jefferson's, and I was working until about 2 a.m. to get through some cases."

"Is there anyone who can corroborate your story?", Kate pressed on, but wasn't surprised when the woman opposite her shook her head. "Mr. Henrikson left at midnight, so… no… But I didn't do it! I swear! Nina was my friend! Why would I have given her all that money without even asking what she needed it for if not to show her my support?!"

At that, Castle jumped into the conversation with a surprised yelp. "You borrowed her 25 Grand without wanting to know why?"

Did Kate just imagine things, or did Sarah actually look offended at that? Her next words seemed to substantiate that presumption: "She… she seemed pretty upset and she told me she would return it soon, before autumn actually, and I had no reason not to trust her! And when she paid half of it back on Tuesday, I …"

This time it was Kate's turn to cut her off. "You told Detectives Ryan and Esposito you hadn't seen her for a week, Sarah."

For a moment, a mixture of defiance and resignation spread on Sarah's face, but she eventually seemed to decide that further lies were of no use to her and she explained with a deep sigh: "That's because I promised her not to say anything. She came to visit me on Tuesday morning and handed me 10,000 Dollars in cash. As you can imagine, I was really surprised and I asked her whether she had gotten a new job already, but she… she just smiled and said she would pay the rest as soon as she had gotten her life back together. Apart from the 25,000 she wanted to borrow and considering that she had been working for the Wellerby's for the last twelve years and been living in that row house of hers for the last seven, I really had no idea what she was talking about, but she promised me to explain everything later and just asked me to keep my mouth shut about the money. Even in that wording – I was really confused, because it wasn't like Nina to give orders and she seemed nervous and not really like herself, but…" Sarah looked up and stared directly into Kate's eyes. "But of course I didn't kill her. We've been friends since high school and I've always been there for her. You have to believe me."

"So she told you that the Wellerby's had fired her for alleged theft, then she hands you 10,000 Dollars and you don't think there might be a connection?", Kate said in order to point her at another inconsistency in her story, but again Sarah shook her head. "You didn't know Nina", she stated with an air of stubbornness: "Nina was really upset about the allegation, and she told me she was actually glad that Martin and Richard had fired her. She said they were bad people and she didn't want to work for them anymore. But she would never, _never_ steal."

That caught Kate's attention. "Bad people? Did she explicate what she meant by that?", she wanted to know. After having met them herself, she was pretty sure that they had something to hide, but whether it had anything to do with Nina's murder still remained a mystery.

"She didn't and I didn't ask", Sarah retorted. "Detective, I have always been there for her, but she was a grown woman and all the times she needed my help, she said so. There was no reason for me to dig deeper. Had I known how it would end this time…" Kate wasn't sure, but it sounded as if Sarah was trying to stifle a sob. "Had I known how it would end this time, don't you think I would have done everything in my power to help her?"

There was especially one thing in Sarah's story that aroused her interest, so she repeated: "All the times? How often did you come to her aid, financially, Sarah?"

Sarah shrugged. "I don't know. A few times. I mean, it's not like I kept count. Somehow Nina always paid me back, so it wasn't an issue, really."

Kate wasn't sure whether Sarah was lying; on the one hand, her story was filled with contradictions and didn't make sense at times, but on the other hand, she did seem to care a great deal about Nina and just wasn't the murderous type. But what did Nina buy for the money borrowed? There had been nothing in her financials that would hint an excessive consumption like designer bags or expensive clothes – nothing except the Dollars she had withdrawn. So it had to be something she had to pay for in cash. Drugs? As far as Kate knew, Lanie hadn't found anything in her system, but of course she would ask her to check more thoroughly. Then what? A gambling addiction? There hadn't been any signs on that in her house, but then again – who would keep evidence of a large gambling debt lying around? And if neither her friend nor her cousin knew about it and CSU had come up empty, then where else could they look?

"Will that be all, Detective?", Sarah asked softly as if she was afraid to interrupt Kate's thoughts.

"If there isn't anything else you can tell me about the money Nina needed, anything that could help me catch her killer…", she tried one last time, but she didn't get any answer this time either. Damn.

CCCCC

Ryan waited patiently until Sarah had left the precinct, before turning to Beckett with the information he could find on Carl and Christopher. When she had said goodbye to Nina's apparently quite wealthy friend, he began: "So, Lila's alibi checks out, and one quite angry neighbor even told me that Lila and Carl actually were at home all night having… ahem… fun, and I think I see a divorce in the foreseeable future. The address part was a little bit tricky, because Mr. Warren apparently had some money issues too and had lived at her place after reaching New York before moving on after the break-up – but she remembered that he had said something about a place in Williamsburg, an abandoned building down by the water where he could … I think the word she used was 'squat for a while."

"Ah, from the stylish high society of Old Westbury to the ruins of Williamsburg's once impressive industrial life", Castle mused with a dreamy expression reserved for moments like these when the writer in him took over. Kate had a more practical approach to the information just gained: Of course she had heard of the old Williamsburg district in Brooklyn, and she also knew that especially one abandoned factory would be of interest: The old Domino Sugar Refinery, closed down in 2004. Considering Mr. Warren's possible location and his financial troubles combined with the fact that his girlfriend had just been murdered made it likely that he was trying to hide from something, which right now made him desirable number one.

Before she could present her next move, Esposito joined the three of them with a gloomy expression on his face. "Sarah didn't know, but she actually has an alibi for last night. I called that law firm she mentioned and they told me about some security cameras outside the main entrance that caught her on tape at 2:37 a.m. this morning leaving the building. Lanie puts Nina's death between 2 and 3 a.m., so I guess we'll have to find ourselves a new suspect."

"I think we might find one in Williamsburg", Kate replied while adding the new lead on the murder board and marking Lila Jensen and Sarah Murdock as dead ends. She wasn't sure what to do about the Wellerby's, however, considering that they were clearly lying, but she had no idea about what or why. Had Nina owed them money? Had she sold some of the heirlooms stolen and now they wanted her to pay for them? But then how could she pay back Sarah? And even if that were the case, it didn't explain why she had needed to borrow money from Sarah in the past. And that Warren guy… Had she owed him money too, or had they maybe been involved in something together that might threaten his life now as well? The different theories were spinning through her head – drugs, theft, gambling, was there anything that made sense somehow, any lead they might have overlooked? A knock on the door interrupted her thoughts and when she looked up, Lara entered with a smile on her lips.

"Nicholas from CSU wanted me to tell you that they didn't find a match on the blonde hair from the brush", she explained, then gazed at the board as if looking for something Kate and the others might have overlooked. Well, good riddance – maybe a fresh pair of eyes would see something new.

"The old sugar refinery in Williamsburg, huh? Creepy area", she finally commented, quite uselessly, before turning on her heel and purring: "Well, I'll go home for today, see you tomorrow boys. And girls", she added as if in afterthought, when her eyes met Kate's, and left the office with swaying hips. Somehow Kate managed to suppress the deep sigh that wanted to make its way out of her throat. Luckily for Lara, she actually did an excellent job as a secretary that somehow seemed to compensate for her annoying behavior.

"I take it we're not following her, are we?", Esposito wanted to know with a barely stifled yawn. When he heard the words spoken out loud, he hurriedly added: "I mean, not literally".

At that, Kate couldn't help but smile. Her partners knew her well, but then again – she couldn't imagine that any of them was ready to call it a day with a major lead like Christopher Warren still not investigated. "No, we're not", she answered, grasped her leather jacket and was already on her way out. "But I _can_ be persuaded to stop for dinner on our way to Brooklyn."

"I'll better tell Jenny I'm coming home late. Again", Ryan muttered while already writing a text on his cell phone. "I swear, one day this job is gonna be the death of me."

Kate was pretty sure those words were meant as a joke, but for some reason, they still sent a chill down her spine.


	6. Chapter 6

Lara had been quite right: This particular part of the Williamsburg area was an eerie place that would have fit well into most of the horror movies Kate had ever seen in her life. Castle's imagination was probably going on a rampage in his mind right now, presenting him with an ocean of possible scenarios that could unfold inside one of the tall, empty buildings with the broken glass and piles of rubble in front. It had taken them a while to get through the traffic in the city and to buy dinner, and by now the sun was already setting and turning the whole scenery into a dark play of colors with long, deep shadows and blood red reflections in the remaining windows. Above them, heavy grey clouds still testified to the hefty fall of rain that had hit the city fifteen minutes before. There was not a soul in sight as they pulled up in front of the old Domino Sugar Refinery at the cross of Kent Ave and S 2nd Street, and once the calming hum of the engine running had been turned off, an uncanny silence encompassed the four of them.

Not surprisingly, it was Castle who first regained his ability to speak. "Sooo", he mumbled long-drawn-out: "This is a great place for a ghost story." As if on cue, the wind freshened and got caught inside the empty buildings, sending howling and rustling noises their way. Sometimes, when he yet again managed to create this kind of a dramatic atmosphere, Kate wondered whether he somehow planned this.

"Don't forget zombies", Ryan joined in with something that seemed to be half a smile, half a shudder. Though his words had probably been a joke (what else could they have been?), his stunningly blue eyes were filled with something that might have been concern or actually fear; Kate wasn't too sure. Esposito didn't seem to notice, because he followed suit with a playfully serious tone of voice: "Yes, crawling around in those shadows, lurking, waiting for unwitting victims…" He ended the sentence with a growled moan that actually managed to give Kate goose bumps and activated her imagination as well… And when she felt a hand on her shoulder, it took all of her self-control not to shriek. A surprised gasp, however, was impossible to hold back and she spun on her heel to present Castle with the most venomous look she could muster. Seriously, how old was he?

Well, at least he managed to lighten the mood a bit, she thought with the hint of a smile while watching Ryan and Esposito grin at her reaction.

"Now, where do we start?" Kate let her gaze wander over the waterfront, taking in possible signs of anyone living here, but apart from a few old cars, some of them with missing tires, a rusty brown van with tinted windows and the burnt remains of a motorcycle, the docks were completely deserted. The factory complex seemed to go on for miles in both directions and consisted of probably over fifty different structures. In the distance between two buildings, she could make out the mast of a sunken boat, probably long since given up upon. If Christopher was living somewhere inside the factory, he either drove something that would never make it through service or he had hidden his vehicle in one of the buildings.

"Well, I know for a fact that some parts of the refinery are a popular place for … well, nightly activities, so if I were Christopher, I'd choose one of the less prominent structures", Esposito mused and followed her glance to the left where the Williamsburg Bridge was just vaguely visible behind two steel stacks with large pipes leading into the building beneath them. On their right, two giant, grey silos were reaching up for the evening sky, almost blocking the view of the warehouse behind them.

"Something just shabby enough that nobody in their right mind would like to enter, but not shabby enough to come crashing down upon him", Castle agreed. "Something like that", he continued pointing at a smaller four or five-story building embedded between two warehouses. The decay, caused by wind and weather, was apparent, but even though Kate wouldn't have entered that particular structure without good reason, she had to agree that it might be exactly what Christopher would go for: nondescript, seemingly decrepit and with two exits, Kate noted as they drew closer to the open steel door on this side of the building. Inside it was dark, with greyish light falling through the small windows and barely illuminating an empty ground floor. The only thing left were a few metal desks in one corner, tossed over and left there like remains of a better time. On the wall opposite to the entrance, Kate could make out a much wider door that could be opened by pushing it to the side. To their right, a staircase was visible, probably leading to the next level.

Ryan knelt down beside her and touched the concrete floor with his finger, drawing her attention to footsteps that led to the door, but not outside. "Guess he uses the other side", he said in a hushed voice and nodded towards the sliding door. Kate agreed with him and moved slowly, carefully through the room to take a look at the dock side of the building. The others followed her quietly (in Castle's case almost quietly), until they had reached the opposite wall. In order not to alarm Christopher, she didn't open the door, but peaked through one of the windows and found exactly what she had been looking for: An old Chevrolet Impala, rusty, but probably still in working order, as far as she could see.

"Let's check upstairs", Esposito proposed in the same whispering tone of voice. They couldn't know how paranoid Christopher was and how he would react to a group of strangers. Kate took a moment to contemplate his suggestion, then shook her head and explained: "We don't know where he's hiding. Castle and I'll cover the exits down here in case he makes a run for it. You two try and find him."

"You got it", Ryan replied and followed Esposito towards the staircase. Kate beckoned Castle to take the smaller door towards Kent Ave while she positioned herself in one of the deep shadows next to the sliding door and waited.

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Though it was getting dark outside, the light from the setting sun was still strong enough to fall through a roof window or a hole in the roof somewhere above them. It was hard to make out details in the dim light, but in order to not alert their suspect, they chose not to use their flashlights as long as they could still find their way without them. Unlike the ground floor, this part of the building had suffered some structural damage and bore signs of the last rain cloud to pass through: The concrete steps were wet and slippery, and if there had been any prints, they were washed away by now, which made it hard to discern which floor to search for Christopher.

At the first level, Ryan paused to listen for a moment and Esposito followed suit instantly; their years as partners had by now been enough to make the use of words to communicate unnecessary. Ryan could read Esposito's body language and facial expressions like a book, and judging by how smoothly their collaboration usually ran he assumed that the same held true for his partner and friend.

Nope, nothing. If Christopher was actually running from someone, he would have kept a wary eye out for any strangers approaching the building and probably made some kind of move when he saw the four of them enter the factory. Assuming he was actually here and the prints didn't belong to anyone else. So after staying silent in front of the door to the first floor for a few heartbeats, Ryan looked up to signal Esposito that he was set on continuing the search on the upper levels. Moving the stairs upwards slowly, they followed the same procedure on the second and third floor and were already on their way further up, when a _thud_ caught both their attention. It had almost been drowned out by the sound of their own footsteps, but Ryan was sure he had heard something and so he stopped dead in his tracks and held his breath. Nothing. The only thing audible right now was the dripping of water onto concrete. Another second went by, then another, and he was just about to write it off as a figment of his imagination, when the _thud_ repeated itself. Really quiet, like a heavy drawer or a door that was closed very, _very_ carefully, but audible nonetheless. And it came from the floor above them.

_Jackpot_, Ryan thought and set his feet in motion again, while the fingers on his right hand already were reaching for the Glock in his holster. Without knowing which role Christopher played in Nina's murder, they'd better be careful. A side glance at his partner showed him that Esposito already had pulled his own weapon, but still was pointing it on the ground.

As they reached the door to the fourth level, it became apparent that they were indeed on the right floor – the door here was open, just an inch, but enough to distinguish itself from the other levels they had seen so far. The dim light emerging from under the crack of the door alone would have been a dead giveaway, though. From behind it, Ryan could now hear a rustling sound like papers being flicked through. Maybe Christopher wasn't as careful as he had given him credit for – apparently the guy hadn't even noticed their presence. Boy, was he in for a surprise. Ryan exchanged a quick look with his partner, then they both nodded and Esposito acted with versed routine: He kicked open the door and called out in a loud and clear tone of voice: "NYP-". The "D" and whatever else he had wanted to say got caught in his throat at the sight that met them on the other side of the door. The first thing to catch Ryan's eye was the body on the floor, lying on its back with broken eyes staring up at the ceiling. Christopher. Damn. A short nylon rope was still wrapped tightly around the man's neck and made it pretty obvious what the cause of death was. He was no expert, but he had learned a thing or two from watching Lanie at work, and judging by the color of the skin, the man hadn't been dead that long yet. Combined with the rustling sound that could only mean one thing: The killer could still be close by. Which lead him to the next thing he noticed – a whooshing sound, light reflecting off metal, and his instincts taking over. With a dexterous movement that consisted partly of training, partly of adrenalin rushing through his veins he threw himself to the right against Esposito and used his body weight to force his partner down with him, shouting: "Down!" as the only explanation. Luckily, it was enough. Esposito's body yielded instantly and they came both crashing down next to the body before the weapon could do any damage to either of them. Ryan could hear it bounce off the metal door and fall to the ground as he was already on his way back up in order to not present too good a target for the next ranged attack. What he hadn't expected was the attacker charging forward with the speed and agility of a feline predator. He hadn't even made it all the way back to his feet, when he saw a dark figure darting towards him – a man, slim, clad in a dark grey tank top with a ski mask covering the face, no visible weapons; those were all the details he managed to take in within half the second it took the attacker to reach him. Overcoming his surprise at the sudden assault, Ryan managed to lift his gun and shout: "NYPD! STOP!", but there was no time to aim and the attacker seemed to know that too, because he threw himself past Ryan with a powerful jump that would have catapulted him right through the door to the staircase.

Would have. Once more, Esposito's training during his time at Special Forces proved to come in handy as he seemed to anticipate the suspect's movement and intercepted his escape with a quite skillful leap upwards that sent him flying into the wall next to the door. The impact was hard enough to make him grunt in pain, but not nearly enough to take him out. With an accurate blow with his elbow, he forced Esposito to evade, then used the heartbeat his strike had bought him to scramble back to his feet and sprint out through the door. Ryan was at his heels a fraction of a second later, darting after him as fast as his legs could carry him, but it still wouldn't have been enough. The man was insanely fast and sure-footed on the slippery steps and would have outpaced the two detectives easily if it hadn't been for another one of Esposito's semi-crazed stunts. Out of the corner of his eye, Ryan saw his partner change course into a direction that shouldn't have been possible – in one smooth motion, Esposito jumped over the handrail and disappeared down the staircase.

"You crazy…", Ryan muttered while still in pursuit. A loud _thud_ and a surprised yelp that did _not_ emerge from his partner's throat told him that Esposito's impulsive plan seemed to be working, and when he reached the third floor he was met with a quite satisfying sight: The attacker was cornered between Esposito on the stairs leading down and Ryan on the stairs leading up, and he did not seem intent on giving the third option, the one Esposito had chosen, a try. Instead he slowly raised his hands and muttered something inaudible under his breath while Esposito closed in on him with his gun raised.

"Don't move", Ryan stated with his own weapon directed at the attacker's head while his partner exchanged the Glock with a pair of handcuffs. Then he explained in an out of breath-voice that clearly stated his discontentment with the whole situation: "You have the right to remain silent", before shoving the man up against the grey wall and expertly twisting his arms on his back to attach the handcuffs.

Though the man seemed to have given in to the inevitable, Ryan didn't relax yet; he had been in this situation far too many times to let his guard down before their suspect was safely back at the precinct. He stayed in his spot a few meters away with his Glock still pointing in the general direction of their suspect, waiting for Esposito to finish reading the guy's Miranda Rights while keeping a close eye on every little sign of resistance that could hint another escape attempt. Considering how agile the man had proven to be before, it was still possible that he contemplated using the fast way down the staircase after all.

Maybe his intense focus on Christopher's suspected killer was the reason he didn't hear the steps approaching him from behind before it was too late. Or maybe his attacker just had velvet paws instead of shoes. An almost inaudible "Don't do anything stupid" reached his ears the same instance he felt the touch of cold metal against the bare skin on his neck. Ryan turned into a statue within a heartbeat. His eyes were still locked onto his partner and his fingers were still tightly clutched around his gun, but he didn't dare to move, not even to breathe. The only thing defying the attacker's order was his heartbeat that had accelerated violently in response to the immediate threat and now seemed to be pounding right up in his throat. When a hand reached out for his Glock and pulled it from his fingers, he didn't even blink. Then, after something that felt like an eternity but probably hadn't been more than a second or two considering that his partner still hadn't locked the cuffs, his senses returned. He had to warn Esposito, he had to…

The decision whether or not to make a sound was taken from him, as another man – not the one with the weapon on him – said in a gruffly tone of voice and in a very weird accent that Ryan couldn't place: "If you would be so kind as to release my associate, Detective Esposito?"

Two things went through Ryan's head in the next second, the first one – _How the hell do they know who we are?! _– being vague and quickly replaced by the much more urgent second one: _Fuck!_ when Christopher's alleged killer took advantage of Esposito's surprise by reacting with something as close to the speed of light as humanly possible. Then again – he had probably known all along that his buddies would find him and just waited for the opportune moment to free himself from the detective's grip with a forceful movement that sent Esposito flying into the wall next to him with an audible _bang_ and seemed to be brutal enough to stun him momentarily. The man followed up on his attack by whirling around and reaching for the Glock in Esposito's belt holster.

What happened next seemed to unfold in slow-motion and made Ryan forget all about his own predicament. The killer managed to pull out the weapon, to direct it towards his partner… Esposito, still dazed, weakly grasped for the muzzle, tried to point it away… and Ryan dashed forward to thrust Esposito out of harm's way.

There were four steps between them; One – a yelp of surprise behind him. Two – Esposito's Glock being cocked. Three – a shadow in the corner of his eyes. Four – he didn't make it to four. Instead, two things happened simultaneously: A hand got a hold of his leather jacket and yanked him back so violently that his air supply was cut off and a shower of stars exploded in front of his eyes. And the terrible sound of a gun being fired followed by an even more horrific scream emerging from Esposito's throat resonated in his ears as he came crashing down on the concrete floor and was rewarded for his insolence with a vicious kick to the stomach that catapulted him even further away from his partner.

Ryan wanted to call out for Esposito, wanted to shout his name in hopes of getting an answer in return, but the treatment had been brutal enough to choke off every sound and left him lying half-conscious on the ground. Somewhere above him he heard agitated voices, shouting, yelling at each other, but they spoke in a tongue he didn't recognize in his current state and even if he had known their meaning, it didn't matter. The only thing – the only _person_ mattering right now was his partner. With a pained cough, Ryan tried to work himself up on his elbows, then on his side, trying feverishly to orientate himself and to locate Esposito. He was almost back where he had been surprised by the attackers, almost next to the door to the third floor. The men – three in all – were only a few feet away from him, engaged in a heated debate, and his partner…

Oh God. Ryan's heart seemed to skip a beat as he noticed the lifeless figure slumped against the wall. Even with his blurry vision and from this distance, it was impossible not to notice the red puddle forming quickly on the floor beside him. "J-javi…", he brought forth between clenched teeth, but silenced himself in order to not draw their attackers' attention towards either of them. Using the doorway next to him as a support, he scrambled to his feet, his gaze switching from his wounded – _wounded, wounded, wounded, not dead_ – partner to the three men in black. As was the case with their suspect, the other two were wearing ski masks as well, and all of them seemed to be too occupied with shouting at each other to notice him. The one in the tank top, Christopher's killer, was still waving the Glock around and the one to his right, a smaller, more wiry man, was holding Ryan's weapon loosely down his side. The last one, a bulky giant of a man, was pointing a gloved finger at Tank Top in something that seemed to be an accusing gesture. Ryan's gaze wandered back to Esposito, and to his great relief, he noticed how his partner's chest moved up and down as he breathed slowly in and out. But he didn't move, which probably meant he was unconscious. Or in a very bad shape. Oh God.

Everything in Ryan screamed to take the chance he'd been given by landing next to a possible escape route. Through the door, find a window, get down to the ground floor somehow, find Beckett, bring back-up. Logical thing to do. Without a weapon and against these three he didn't stand a chance alone. But what if they decided to finish the job Tank Top had started while he was gone? What if he came back with help only to find Esposito dead with a bullet in his head? No way would he let that happen. And considering his lack of weapons and Jackie Chan-skills, there was only one way to go. Though he didn't understand the language the three men were speaking, it was clear that they – apart from trying to find out who to blame – were trying to figure out how to proceed with the sudden interference of two cops. If there was an angle he could work that might get them out of here alive, it was this one.

"You're… you're running out of time", Ryan huffed, every single word hurting in his throat as he uttered it. He still had to use the door frame to keep his balance and he was still seeing double, but that was probably a good thing right now. They wouldn't see him as a threat as long as he looked like something the cat had dragged in. "Back-up is on … is on its way, so you… you better get the hell out of here."

Another sentence in the foreign language coming from Tank Top, something like _Der blufft doch nur_, but one word he understood just fine: Bluff. Another precious second went by as the three attackers stared at him as if he had lost his mind. God, he hoped he had learned something from Castle at poker nights, he thought while trying desperately to hold his gaze steady and not to look past the men at his partner. Still he knew that the few tricks he had picked up from Beckett's companion weren't enough to hide the fear that threatened to consume him. _Don't you die on me, Javi!_ Ryan pushed himself away from the doorway and made a shaky step towards the attackers with his arms raised in a surrendering motion. "I called them when we saw the open door to Christopher's apartment. That leaves you about one minute to get out of here", he continued, his voice more steady by now. _Don't you dare to die on me! _The next step seemed to be one too far, because Tank Top raised the Glock and pointed it directly at his chest, but the Giant barked a single word that made the man lower the weapon again.

"I believe you, Detective Ryan, and that puts us in quite a pickle, doesn't it?", the man then said in a much calmer voice that sent shivers down Ryan's spine. How on earth did they know their names? And if they knew about them, what else did they know? "You see, this was supposed to be a quick in and out, and here you two and your cavalry are, meddling in our business. So how do you suggest we proceed?" The words were spoken syllable for syllable, making it obvious that the man, though he did master the English language, was unused to speaking it. Not that that kind of information helped him at all in his current situation. Ryan decided to play along – what other choice did he have? Answering: _I suggest you surrender_ probably wouldn't do any good anyways. "I suggest…", he said with a side glance at Javi's unconscious frame, "…that you don't make your case any worse by actually killing a cop. You leave now and I'll make sure you're not being followed." Bluffing again – there was no way he could stop Beckett from pursuing the men who had dared to shoot a member of her team.

Ryan could see how the lips behind the ski mask curled into something that could have been a smile. And seeing the villains smile was never a good thing, neither in the movies nor in real life. At first he thought the guy had just called his bluff, but his next move made clear that he had decided to take Ryan at his word. "An excellent idea, Detective", the man remarked. "If you would be so kind as to put those cuffs on your belt to good use?" As if on cue, the small guy took a step towards him and lifted the gun to the level of Ryan's head – an unmistakable gesture. Not good. And certainly not according to his spontaneous and apparently ill-conceived plan B.

"I think you and I have differing opinions of what 'good use' means", Ryan muttered while he fumbled with the metal cuffs on his belt. His hands were still shaking, which made the quite simple routine of unlocking them a lot harder than it should have been, and the Glock in front of him certainly didn't help. His own weapon. His own handcuffs. If the situation hadn't been so serious with Javi's and his own life at stake, it would almost have been ironic. Almost. He finally succeeded in closing them around his wrists without dropping them to the floor, which earned him another grin from the Giant. As he locked them into place with a far too audible _click _and felt the Giant's fingers close around his shoulder with an iron grip, his heart sank even more. No way out anymore. And to make matters worse, now he probably _was_ going to make sure nobody followed them. With a last, quick gander at his wounded partner, he allowed his captor to push him forward towards the stairs leading down to the ground level. Down to Beckett and Castle. They must have heard the shot, they must have heard the argument, but considering that they hadn't tried to interfere probably meant that they actually had chosen the logical path and called for back-up.

His thoughts were interrupted when he noticed something alarming and stopped dead in his tracks, causing the large man to stumble into him and forcing him another step down by sheer momentum. As he tried to turn around, tried to shove the guy out of the way, tried to get back to his partner in time, he already knew he was too late. The silent _click_ was already being followed by the much louder, much deadlier sound of a gun being fired, and if his partner uttered a scream, it was drowned out by Ryan's own frantic yell: "JAVI!"


	7. Chapter 7

The instance the shot had resonated in the staircase, two thoughts went through Kate's head. She acted on the first – _Get Castle out of the line of fire –_ out of pure instinct, grabbing her companion by his shoulders and pushing him down behind one of the desks with adrenalin-enhanced strength. Castle was far too surprised to put up any resistance, but when she got back up to follow up on her second thought – _Ryan, Esposito!_ – he reacted a lot faster than she had thought him capable of. His hand grasped her wrist and he whispered in a commanding tone of voice: "Kate, wait!".

The sound of the gun shot changed into loud, angry shouts, and they weren't Ryan or Esposito's. She managed to discern three different male voices, but she couldn't understand a single word. Three – three voices?! It didn't make any sense. There was supposed to be one guy up there – one! "Let me go!", Kate shot back and tried to break away, but even though Castle didn't have her training, he was still a lot stronger and apparently not intent on giving in to her will. "They need h–"

He cut her short with a look that expressed a deep concern, a fear for his own life and that of his friends, combined with a steely determination, and the words: "I know. But you're not helping them by running into the line of fire like a rookie. We need back-up."

Though everything inside her screamed to get into that staircase to come to her partners' aid, she also knew he was right. Which meant she had to get back to the car – how could she have been so reckless? Finding Christopher, bringing him in for questioning… It should have been so easy that she had deemed radios and safety jackets, standard protocol, unnecessary. But there was no time to blame herself right now – that could and _would_ happen later, as she knew only too well. Now she needed to get out of here and back to the car before …

The scream was shrill enough to pierce marrow and bone and occupied every single thought she had had up till that point. Judging by the look of pure terror on Castle's face, he had heard the word hidden inside the outcry as well – a name that they knew only too well. Javi. Oh God. This wasn't happening. This just wasn't happening. It took Kate every grain of self-restraint to take back control over her own thoughts and her body that seemed to be hell-bent on casting any caution to the wind. _Think clearly_, she forced herself to calm down. _Back-up_. _Now_. _Go get back-up_.

She raised herself up, peering at the doorway to the stairs and trying to assess the time it would take her to dart through the warehouse and reach the parking lot in front of the factory. Half a minute, maybe one minute. Should be possible. "I'll –", she was about to say when another shot caught her utmost attention and made her throw herself down next to Castle again. The bullet ricocheted off the metal desk without doing any harm, but the signal it had sent was clear: No way could she get out that way.

"Woah!", her companion exclaimed and they both ducked lower, protecting their heads with their arms, but the attack wasn't followed up upon with the rain of fire that she had expected. Instead a deep voice resounded in the warehouse: "We know you're there, Detective. You and your pathetic excuse for an author." The words sounded as if they were spoken very carefully and they were filled with an accent that she couldn't place, but it wasn't like she had the time to think about it. The man growled something in a foreign language and she could hear footsteps running from the scene towards the door on the parking lot side. Then he directed his attention towards her and Castle again: "I want you to listen, and I want you to listen carefully."

Oh, she listened carefully, alright. She usually did when somebody was threatening her life, especially when she at the same time was concerned about the well-being of her partners. Her fingers were playing with her gun almost on their own, but without knowing which aces the guy had up his sleeves, there was no way she would use it. The scream still resonated in her ears and made her painfully aware of the fact that she had no idea if Esposito was still alive and what had happened to Ryan afterwards.

The next sound at least answered one of her questions: A cry of pain reached her ears and there was no mistaking the source: Kevin. This time, her body acted before logic could kick in, and she jumped to her feet, her gun pointed at the doorway to the staircase. Castle managed to pull her back down almost as quickly as she had gotten up, but she had seen enough to know that they were in way over their heads. There were two guys in black clothes and with ski masks over their heads, a very large, bulky one and a smaller, athletic one, both with guns in their hands. Ryan was kneeling between them, hands behind his back and apparently only held upright by the slim guy who had dug his nails into the Detective's brown hair and was pressing his weapon against Ryan's throat. Even from this distance and in the fading light, Kate could see the pained expression on her partner's face and considering recent events she was pretty sure that those had been tears glistening on Ryan's cheeks. Oh God. Esposito… Kate took a deep breath, placed her useless service weapon on the concrete next to her and stood up once more, very, _very_ slowly and despite Castle's _Get back down_-expression and exclaimed: "I'm listening."

She saw the large man smile underneath the mask and wished she could wipe that expression off his face with a well-placed punch. "Here are our terms, Detective Beckett", he said, seemingly unimpressed by her previous stunt. "If you want to see Detective Ryan again alive –" At that the other guy tightened his grip and was rewarded with a quiet whimper that cut directly into Kate's heart. "you will not investigate this case any further." From the outside, she could hear the sound of an engine roaring to life – probably their escape vehicle – but there was nothing she could do about that right now. Not if she didn't want to endanger Kevin's life further. Dammit! She was clenching her fists so tight, the skin on her knuckles turned a ghostly white. Was there nothing she could do? Nothing at all? Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Castle get up too and soon felt his hand on her shoulder, and she was thankful for the gentle squeeze that made her relax just a little bit and made it possible for her to think. There wasn't that much time before the vehicle would be at the door, and she had to make every second count.

"How do I know you'll keep your word?", she asked in as strong a voice as she could muster. The answer didn't surprise her, but still hurt like a knife being plunged into her heart: "You do not. But I promise you, if you _do_ continue looking into Nina Carrera's death, Detective Ryan will wish that he had never been born." The words were powerful enough – she had gotten the message –, but the slim guy apparently felt a need to underline them nevertheless by forcing Ryan to his feet and using the handle of the gun to place a hard blow in her partner's midriff that made him stagger one step forward. The punch had been hard enough to cause him trouble breathing which his assaulter acknowledged with a widespread grin.

"Alright, alright!", she called out before that sadistic bastard would take her silence as an excuse to hurt Ryan further. "We'll close the case, I promise. Just leave him alone!" Though she tried really hard to make her voice sound commanding and self-assured, she could feel how miserably she failed. Seeing Ryan like this, still not knowing what had happened to Esposito… Slowly, but surely the wall she had built around herself began to crumble and she was eternally grateful for Castle's reassuring touch. This wasn't the time to fall apart.

"Oh, do not worry, Detective Beckett. As long as you keep your nose out of our affair, I will keep my associate from harming your partner any further", the large man said in that calm, chilling voice of his, though his eyes were by now directed towards the doorway out. Kate discovered the brown van the same instant Ryan's captors did and she could have flogged herself for not investigating the vehicle when she had seen it before. "Now allow me to bit you adieu", he went on and gave his associate a sign that caused him to grab Ryan at the shoulder and push him towards the way out. The gun was pointed at the floor now, as if the guy didn't deem it necessary to threaten Ryan directly anymore, and apparently her partner saw the chance that presented itself to whirl around and yell: "Javier's been shot. Third fl–" The last word turned into an agonized gasp when his captor drove his elbow into Ryan's solar plexus before slamming him into the wall next to the doorway with such force that Kate could see how consciousness drained out of him quickly. The large man said a word in the foreign language – something like _Trottle_ – and helped his associate to half-drag, half-catapult Ryan into the open van before the side door crashed shut and the van left the factory area with screeching tires.

Kate didn't lose one precious second. "Ambulance!", she yelled while already diving across the knocked over desk and darting towards the staircase as quickly as her feet would carry her. _Hang on, Javi_, she thought and had to fight down the panic that now finally had decided to roam freely in her upset mind. Right now, there was nothing she could do for Ryan but make sure that his partner survived, and that was exactly what she intended to do. She thought she heard Castle say something behind her, but she was enhancing the distance between them too fast to understand his words, already sprinting through the doorway and taking the stairs up to the third floor three steps at a time, her heart pounding heavily, painfully in her chest. _Hang on, Javi!_ The scream, the tears on Kevin's cheeks, his panicky tone of voice all should have prepared her for the worst, but when she saw Esposito lying there on the floor and all that blood – _Oh God, so much blood_ – she couldn't help but let out a short cry of fear, anger, despair, before her senses returned to her and first aid measures came flowing into her mind. It wasn't before she had thrown herself down next to Esposito that she recognized the first aid attempts that already had been made – one makeshift bandage around his chest and stomach, one around his left thigh, made out of a formerly white, torn blouse that already was turning red, but was quite taut and prevented Esposito from bleeding out. Or had at least done so until now. Kate hurriedly took off her own blouse to use it as a tourniquet to compress arterial circulation in his leg – judging by the amount of blood oozing through the makeshift bandage, his attacker must have hit the femoral artery, and that was bad. Really bad. Though the bullets hadn't hit anything immediately vital like heart or lungs – if they had, he'd be dead by now –, the blood loss alone was life-threatening, and he needed antibiotics _fast_ in order to avoid septic shock due to infection from the stomach wound. She just hoped Castle had gotten a hold of that ambulance yet.

"Hang in there, Javi. Please, please hang in there!", she whispered while applying the tourniquet. Whether it was due to the pain she caused him, or whether he just recognized a friendly voice, she didn't know, but suddenly his eyelids fluttered and he mumbled something inaudible. Kate crept closer towards him and tried to catch his gaze, but his eyes were glassy and seemed to stare into nothing, as if he didn't even notice she was there. His lips moved again, forming one word, and when she placed her ear next to his mouth, she was able to understand what he was saying: "R-ryan?". A piercing sting went through Kate's chest. Despite the blood loss and his half-conscious state, Esposito's only worry was still his partner's wellbeing, just as Ryan's only worry had been Javi's, even with a gun to his head. _Oh, guys_, she thought and whispered with a heavy heart: "He's… he's alright. Don't worry." She hated lying to him, but in his current state she thought it best not to upset him further. Apparently, those words had been all he needed to hear, because his lips curled into something like a smile before his head sank back onto his chest. He'd drifted back into unconsciousness, which probably was for the best. Kate made sure the tourniquet was tightly secured, then she leaned back and let her thoughts flow freely. Instantly they began circulating around the bandage she had found on her partner. The blouse looked like it belonged to a woman, and though she hadn't seen the last person of the trio that had attacked Ryan and Esposito, she was pretty sure she hadn't heard a female voice before. And even if she had, it didn't make any sense that they would treat Esposito after shooting him. So who had helped him?

"Ambulance is on its way", Castle pulled her from her thoughts as he knelt down beside them with a concerned expression on his rugged features. "How bad is it?"

It was horridly bad, but Kate didn't have to say that for Castle to know. On the one hand, it didn't take a psychic to read her facial expression, and on the other hand, he had done enough GSW research to know a fair deal about the seriousness of a punctured artery and the risks of an open gastrointestinal tract. And if that wasn't enough, her barely stifled tears were a dead giveaway. _Don't die on me!_, she thought once more and used all of her body strength to put more pressure on the arterial wound. How much blood had he lost already? How much more could his body take? "You hang in there, Javier Esposito!", she hissed, only first noticing that she had spoken the words out aloud when Castle muttered: "Can't be long now. I'll meet them downstairs." Then she was alone with her thoughts and her dying partner once more, focusing intently on his breathing that seemed to grow weaker by the second.

Kate was completely taken by surprise, when a hushed voice asked from behind her: "Is he… is he going to be okay?"

Kate's head snapped around and her gaze locked with that of a young woman who stood in the doorway to the third floor. The first thing Kate noticed were the long, blonde locks that were reaching a long way down her back – blonde hair, like on the brush, she thought – next the sapphire blue eyes that stared at her filled with fear. She was tall, almost half a head higher than Kate, and very skinny, as the lack of a top revealed – now at least she knew where the white blouse had come from.

"Thank you for aiding him", Kate muttered with a nod in Esposito's direction. "He has lost a lot of blood and I… I don't know if he'll make it. But at least you gave him a fighting chance." She meant every word – without the immediate help, the blood loss might already have been too much before she had reached her partner. The woman – more of a girl, really, Kate assessed her to be seventeen, maybe even younger – smiled timidly and said in a thick accent: "I could not just leave him there." It wasn't the same accent Ryan's kidnappers had spoken; this one she had heard many times before. Eastern European, probably Russian, which really didn't make any sense, but at this point Kate had stopped trying to make sense of anything concerning this case. At this point all she could think about were the nerve-racking minutes it took the ambulance to make it out to the sugar refinery, and all her energy went into preventing the blood to flow too freely from Javier's wounds. It was only after she finally heard the siren coming closer, after she saw the paramedics haste towards them and helped them get Esposito on the gurney, only after she was sure that there was nothing more she could do for her partner, that she thought about turning around to face Esposito's savior once more. But by then, the girl was gone.


	8. Chapter 8

Kate heard Lanie's voice long before she saw her, and it sounded just as panicky and desperate as she had felt from the moment she had seen Esposito's body on the stairs. The feeling had only grown worse with every minute she had spent outside the E.R. Though she had protested loudly, she had been kicked out by a male nurse and left in the dark concerning her partner's condition, and though she knew that the nurse had only done his job, letting go of Javier's hand after holding it all the way from the sugar refinery to the Brooklyn Hospital Center had been one of the hardest things she had ever been forced to do in her life. The paramedics hadn't been able to tell her anything she hadn't known already, but at least they were able to start the blood transfusion right there and then and could administer antibiotics to minimize the risk of septic shock. The stomach wound – not that bad, even though it looked like something out of a war movie. The femoral artery on the other hand… His hand had been so fearfully cold, and though Kate had tried to communicate with him when he had opened his eyes again, his gaze had still been blank, empty.

"Where is he?! _Where is he?!_", her friend cried out as she approached Kate with tears streaming down her face. A young police officer came trailing behind her; probably the one that had been sent to tell her about the shooting and the terrible outcome that had put Esposito behind those now closed doors. Kate wasn't sure whether Lanie would accept her comfort considering that her boyfriend had been hurt during Kate's watch, but she still opened her arms in a welcoming gesture and was relieved when Lanie accepted the hug for a fraction of a second. Then she broke away and stared up at Kate with eyes so filled with worry it almost broke her heart. "How… how…" Her voice cracked and the words turned into a violent sob that shook her entire body. "_How is he?!_"

There was no reason to lie. Though Kate had excellent bluffing skills, they weren't nearly good enough to actually gloss over the fear for Javier's and Kevin's lives that threatened to overwhelm her. The only reason she wasn't crying right now were her iron discipline and her pronounced logic that told her that now wasn't the time to break. There was nothing she could do for Javier, but Kevin was still out there, most likely in mortal danger, and she wouldn't help either of them if she didn't keep herself together.

"It's too early to tell", she whispered and caressed Lanie's back with something she hoped was a comforting gesture. "He's lost a lot of blood…" The same thing the paramedics had kept telling her, so many times it had made her angry. She wasn't blind. She wasn't stupid. Of course she had seen that he had lost _a lot of blood_, but had it been _too_ much? The words achieved another reaction altogether when spoken to Lanie – her friend threw herself forward, back into Kate's arms, and grasped her so tight, she had trouble breathing. But she didn't say anything and she made no move to loosen the woman's grip. It was her fault that Javier was lying on that operating table, and it was her fault that Kevin was in the hands of those bastards, and feeling Lanie's fingernails dig painfully deep into her back was a welcome distraction from the accusations she kept tossing at herself.

"W-what…", she heard Lanie whimper and prepared herself to answer one of the questions she dreaded the most. "How did this… how did it happen?" The men who had taken Ryan had been quite clear on their terms, which made it impossible for Kate to tell Lanie the truth right now, so she swallowed the true explanation, which left a bitter taste on her tongue, and replied slowly, carefully: "We… we expected to apprehend a suspect in the Carrera case, but we… we were in the wrong place. There was this junky, and he freaked out when he saw them and things got out of hand. Lanie, I am so, so sorry."

There came no answer, but she could feel how her friend pulled away from her, released her, took a few steps away from her. She didn't say anything, but Kate was sure that the new emotion that flickered to life in Lanie's eyes and got mixed with the fear for Javier's safety was blame. "I am sorry", she said again, though the words sounded hollow and empty in her own ears. Sorry wasn't enough to save Esposito. Sorry wasn't enough to get Ryan out of this mess. Sorry wasn't enough to describe how miserable she felt inside. She only managed to withstand Lanie's glare for a heartbeat longer before she could feel the heat of forming tears burning in the corner of her eyes.

If it hadn't been for the opening of the double winged doors that same instant, Kate knew she wouldn't have been able to hold back the tears any longer. But the sight of the surgeon managed to pull her back into the here and now and she hurriedly wiped away the salty water with her hand before facing him with an expectant look in her eyes. Lanie's voice was still shrill and filled with desperation when she wanted to know: "_How is he?!"_

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That last punch followed by his unfortunately quite intimate meeting with a concrete wall had been enough to turn most of his abduction into a blur. All Ryan remembered clearly was being thrown into the van and hitting his head for a second time when it collided with a metallic item on the floor of the vehicle. It was enough to finally make him black out – for how long, he couldn't say. The next thing he perceived was the humming of an engine underneath him and an all-pervasive smell of rubber that reached his nostrils. He tried to open his eyes, but it took him several attempts before he could finally make out the hard, black mat he was laying on. There was some kind of pattern on it, stripes probably, but they were dancing around in the dim light like tiny snakes and the movement along with the disgusting odor made him feel nauseated, so he hurriedly turned his gaze away and regretted that decision as well when a piercing headache seemed to try and tear his head apart. Memories of the minutes before his abduction flooded through his mind, the staircase, Esposito's stunt to apprehend Christopher's killer, the other guys, the gun shot… No! Dwelling on that terrifying sight of his partner… his friend… wouldn't help him right now. He had to regain consciousness fully in order to jump at any opportunity that presented itself – well, probably not _jump_ jump in his current condition, that would just cause him to black out again. But he had to know his surroundings, had to know his captors, anything that might help him with his escape. So Ryan closed his eyes for a few seconds again and focused on his breathing, in-out, in-out, until he had managed to clear his mind enough for the overwhelming memories to pass. Only then did he resurface. The nausea and his head were still causing him trouble concentrating, but at least he didn't feel the urgent need to empty his stomach any more. He was lying on his right side, his hands still locked firmly behind his back by the handcuffs, but, as far as he could tell without moving around too much, his feet hadn't been tied up. Not that much of a consolation right now, but better than nothing. Out of the corner of his eyes, he discovered some kind of box to his right – a tool box, maybe? – that probably was the reason for his recent unconsciousness and the splitting headache, judging by the blood on one corner. Concussion – huh, that _did_ explain the way he was feeling. Damn, he was lucky that he had woken up at all. Directing his attention to his left, he noticed a pair of heavy boots with steel caps, presumably belonging to one of the kidnappers, which meant that the guy had to be sitting right next to him. One had to be driving the vehicle, so where was the last one? Out front with the driver? Or behind him? His silent question was answered by a voice that he knew only too well by now – the Giant – but he was speaking in the unknown language again.

"_Ganz schön hart im Nehmen, der Bursche_", the guy said. Now that he had time to think, Ryan was pretty sure that he had heard that language before, but that knowledge wasn't enough to help him decipher the meaning behind those words. But apparently his captor had been talking about him; though he had been really careful not to move around too much or to make any sound, they must have noticed that he was awake, because the next thing he discerned was one of the boots next to him being lifted. Not good. He tried to evade, but as there almost wasn't any space in the bottom of the van in the first place, he still got the full impact of the kick to his stomach and was jerked from his current position into a much more uncomfortable one resting on his back. For a second, a firework of colors exploded in front of his eyes and threatened to throw him back into unconsciousness, but he managed to strive against the tempting darkness before it could subdue him once more. If he really was suffering from a concussion, blacking out again might be the last thing he ever did, and he wasn't ready to die here, not without knowing whether Javier would make it, not with these bastards still roaming around freely!

His captors didn't make it easy on him, however – the guy that had kicked him placed the boot on his chest and put enough weight on him for the sharp metal cuffs to cut achingly deep into his wrists and loin until he couldn't hold back a cry of pain anymore. Or at least he would have cried out, if it hadn't been for the lack of air the brutal weight on his thorax caused him – all that managed to escape his throat was a breathless whimper that turned into a distressed cough when he realized that he actually couldn't breathe anymore. He could feel panic rise up inside him, threatening to overpower him for a heartbeat until his training kicked in and he managed to soothe himself. _Yes, you can breathe. Not much, but enough. If they wanted to kill you, you'd be dead by now. Breathe. Breathe. Calm down._

He had no idea what the Giant said to the other guy when he heard the words "_Wir brauchen ihn noch_", but it caused him to take down the boot and place it close to Ryan's face instead; the threat was unmistakable, but even if Ryan had wanted to get up or put up any resistance, he wouldn't have been able to do so right now. For the next minute or so he just made full use of his lungs and filled them with the stuffy, icky-smelling air in the van that shouldn't have tasted as wonderful as it did. Only very slowly did his surroundings come back into focus, and what he saw wasn't all that encouraging. He was lying in the narrow space between two opposite bench seats in the windowless cabin of the van with the only source of illumination stemming from a small overhead light near the side door. Both captors stared down at him from their places on the benches. The Giant, an older guy with tightly cut, grey hair and dark, almost black eyes, had a pensive, dissatisfied expression on his edged features, while Tank Top, presumably in his late thirties and with short, blond hair, had something like murderous anticipation in his dark brown eyes. The discouraging part weren't their expressions, however disconcerting they were. It was the lack of ski masks on their faces that really set his teeth on edge, because it could only mean one thing: Despite their promises, they had no intention of letting him leave alive.


	9. Chapter 9

Hi there! I just wanted to say sorry that it took me so long to update – I had a few exams that needed passing (and – fortunately – have been passed now). But now I'm back and will hopefully post a new chapter each week. Thanks for reading – I hope you'll enjoy the next part!

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Every grain of strength seemed to drain out of her body at once, and Kate let herself slump into one of the blue chairs in the waiting room as elegantly as a bag of spuds. The adrenalin that had held her upright up until this point was gone, her energy depots depleted. One sentence resonated in her ears, over and over again, not giving her the relief she had sought, but – thank God – not confronting her with her worst fear either: _If he makes it through the night…_

Lanie's expression had been indecipherable to her – there was still fear, mixed with just the tiniest hint of hope, but something else too that she hadn't been able to read. When she had demanded to see Javier, the nurse that had thrown Kate out of the E.R. half an hour ago had exchanged uneasy glances with the surgeon, but when the man had nodded, he had led Lanie away from Kate and closed the doors behind them once more, leaving her alone with her thoughts.

_If he makes it through the night.._. If. She had waited for half an hour for an absolution that had yet to come, leaving her with more of the same chaotic thoughts as before. It hadn't felt like thirty minutes when she had been waiting outside the E.R.; more like an eternity. She had been afraid of losing her partners before, had lived through the overwhelming sensation of fear and desperation that came with the knowledge of somebody close to her being in danger, but each time there had been something she could _do_. When Castle and Ryan had been overpowered by 3XK, she had been able to rush to their aid. When Ryan and Esposito had been abducted by Lockwood, she had been able to figure out their whereabouts to save them. But this? Standing helplessly by? There was nothing worse than being unable to act. She was no surgeon – apart from basic first aid, she couldn't have helped Javier any more than she had done at the sugar refinery. And Kevin? She had no idea how much those bastards knew, how they procured their information, and that meant that her hands were completely tied if she didn't want to risk his life.

"Dammit!", she hissed, clenched her hand into a fist and slammed it into the wall next to her as hard as she could. As before, the pain was a most welcome distraction, but it didn't solve anything and only caught unwanted attention from the other people waiting. There were three of them; a mother with her three-, maybe four-year old daughter who was sleeping on her lap, and a young man with his nose buried in a book. He looked up at her sudden outburst, but didn't comment on it, which she was really thankful for. She had to get out. She was in no condition to be around others right now, and she didn't feel strong enough to face Lanie again tonight, so she pushed herself up and was just on her way out into the hallway, when she was held back by a commanding voice calling her name: "Kate!"

She turned around only to meet Roy's concerned gaze. Her superior and Castle were rushing towards her from the other side of the room, and even though there was nothing she wanted to do more than just hurry on and away from them, she stood her ground and waited for the captain to grasp her shoulders as if he was afraid that she would actually run away from him. "Kate, are you alright?", he asked in his deep, serious tone of voice. "I came as fast as I could after I got the call."

"Esposito…", Kate began. She could hear how fragile her own voice sounded, but she went on nonetheless: "They can't say anything for sure yet, but…"

Roy shook his head and tried again: "I know, Kate. I didn't ask about Detective Esposito."

He knew her well – too well, in a situation like this, she thought and tried to buy herself some time by directing her attention towards Castle: "How're you holding up?" She hadn't seen him after he had left her with Esposito in the staircase to show the paramedics the way, which would have made her wonder what he was up to under normal circumstances. But considering that there was nothing normal about this evening, she hadn't even spent a single thought on the writer's whereabouts until he stood right in front of her.

"Castle was the one who called me", Roy explained in an attempt to get her to focus on him. "He told me what happened." That _did_ get Kate's attention, because it meant that someone else was now involved in this unfortunate situation, which wasn't something the kidnappers had forbidden but probably still wasn't in their interest. Then again – if there was anyone she trusted completely to handle this case delicately and prudently, it was her captain, and he would have found out sooner or later anyways. Knowing him, probably sooner.

Castle actually looked hurt at her reaction – an ice-cold glance in his direction – and he sent her his _Oh-don't-give-me-that-look_-expression, but before she could have said or done anything, Roy pointed at a door to one of the consulting offices and said: "I think we really need to talk."

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"You did _what_?!", Kate snarled when she heard _what_ Castle had done after the paramedics had brought her and Esposito to the hospital. Maybe she _should_ have spent just a single thought on her companion, but now it was too late, and her first thought was to just punch him right in the face to wipe off that expression of deep concern for her. If there was something he had to be concerned for, it was the Detective's life he had just endangered.

"As I said, I told the paramedics that Esposito's attacker had fled and that there was no need to search the building, and then I went up to the fourth floor to find out what our villains had been looking for – considering that they were interrupted by our arrival. And I didn't see anything in their hands when they left. Did you?", he muttered, clearly taken aback by her fierce reaction.

"Yes, I did!", she retorted with barely concealed fury. "My partner! And as opposed to you, I actually _listened_ when they commanded us to stop investigating!" She still felt that urge to plant her fist on that big nose of his, but if she thought about it logically, Castle's action only made sense. They had left the building, after all, and if she wanted to keep even the slightest hope alive to find Ryan (no, she didn't believe in their promise to return him), she needed clues – clues that she wouldn't be able to find once the investigation was closed.

Roy made a soothing sound and directed his next question towards Castle: "That was a good move, Castle. Did you find anything?"

Kate could see that Castle wasn't as convinced by the rightness of his own action as the captain was, but he nodded nonetheless and went on: "Christopher's body. They didn't have the time to hide him and as far as I could tell he had only been dead half an hour or so, which means they arrived there only shortly before us."

"Which is quite a coincidence…", Kate's superior mused, but he was interrupted by Castle, who explained with his hands folded in front of his chest: "Begging your pardon, sir, but I don't think it _was_ a coincidence. They knew _exactly_ who we were".

Kate knew Castle well enough to tell how shaken he still was by current events and especially by the fact that one of the thugs had addressed him with his job title, which meant that they not only knew who _he_ was, but who his family was as well. But somehow, inexplicably for her, he seemed to hide it better than her. Maybe because he didn't have the weight of her responsibility on his shoulders, she pondered. It wasn't his order that almost had gotten – and still might get – Javier killed and Kevin abducted, after all. "Which can only mean one thing", Castle continued after a short pause. "They knew we were going to that sugar refinery to find Christopher."

"Which in turn means that somebody must have told them", Roy concluded with a deep sigh. "I don't suspect any of you spoke of the case outside the precinct." There was a question hidden in his words; not because he didn't trust them to handle a murder case professionally, Kate knew, but because the alternative was even more terrible.

"No, sir", she whispered.

After that, none of them said something for a minute, maybe two – she didn't keep count. It was apparent on both Roy's and Castle's faces that they were thinking about other possibilities, possibilities that were less awful, and she constituted no exception. Her thoughts were racing through her mind, passing through every single detail of the case, every person that had been involved. Could Lila Jensen have told the attackers about the sugar refinery and the cops looking into the Carrera case? Did any of the other suspects involved hide vital information about Christopher and his whereabouts? Or would they have to face the fact that there _was_ a snitch at the 12th that had followed their investigation and used it to lead the attackers right to Christopher's hiding place? If that was the case, then it surely did explain the kidnapper's certainty that he would know of any further investigation, and if that was the case, they couldn't do anything – anything at all – without jeopardizing Ryan's life.

Roy was the first to break the silence. "Concerning the investigation of the Carrera case…"

Kate didn't believe her own ears. Had Roy not listened to their story? Hadn't she made it perfectly clear that any kind of investigation into Nina Carrera's murder would be tantamount to her signing Kevin's death certificate? But as she began to protest, Roy interrupted her with a decisive gesture and went on: "…I am afraid there are no more leads to follow. Therefore, I see myself forced to close the investigation for now. Detective Beckett, please shelve what we have on the case first thing in the morning, and make sure that everyone at the precinct sees the empty board. I have assigned Detective Ryan on the case of the… ahem… junky who attacked Detective Esposito, and of course I will explain the situation to Jenny."

How could she ever have doubted him? She knew that he was breaking about every rule in the book right now and risked his own position to buy her time to find Ryan without going through official channels, and she also knew that he wouldn't be able to keep the details of the closed case a secret forever, so she just nodded and muttered: "Thank you, sir." There were still things he didn't know – mainly about the blonde woman she had met in the factory, but the less he knew about her unofficial investigation, the better.

"For what? Taking you off the case?", he replied with a smirk. It didn't cover up the concern in his eyes, but it still somehow managed to lighten the mood just enough for her to feel like a stone had been lifted from her heart. "I'll better check on my ME and Detective Esposito", Roy added and got up from the desk he had used as a provisional chair: "And I'll see you two in the morning." With that he left the office and went back to the hospital's waiting room. Kate followed him with her eyes until he was gone, then turned around to tell Castle her plan for the night – there was not a second to waste.

Apparently, he agreed, because he met her gaze with a lop-sided grin and said: "I show you mine if you show me yours."

Somehow she just knew he wasn't talking about _that_.


	10. Chapter 10

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Kate had accepted Castle's offer to spend the night at his place without hesitation. She was far too upset to be alone right now and she was grateful for each distraction she could find. Of course, when he told her that he had something to show her, something important, it didn't make his case any worse.

He had taken the Crown Vic to the hospital, but she was too tired to argue with him about who should drive her service car, so she just sat down on the passenger seat and closed her eyes for a minute. It had been a long day and it would be an even longer night and she just needed a moment to relax, to shake off everything that had happened. There was nothing more she could do for Esposito. She would start her private investigation to find Ryan as soon as they got to Castle's apartment. For now she just needed to regain her strength. At least until Castle opened his mouth and added a new piece to the puzzle.

"You know, I've thought about that accent?", he said calmly as he started the engine.

"Hm-hm?", she gave back without opening her eyes.

"That was a German accent." When she didn't react, he went on: "You know, like Arnold? I'll be back?" His Terminator-imitation was quite good, but suddenly she found herself far too occupied with thoughts to respond to his words. She knew that feeling well – the feeling of a lot of puzzle pieces laying on the table, without any connection, without any visible pattern, and then suddenly, _bam_, the one missing piece turned up and the pattern emerged. With a jolt, Kate sat up and hissed a single word: "Zimmermann."

She didn't expect Castle to understand – the thought had come to her suddenly, unexpectedly, and she wasn't even sure of how correct her reasoning was. But it was a lot more than she had had before.

"Gesundheit!", Castle retorted with a confused side glance at her. Kate resisted her reflex to say "Thank you!" and explained instead: "No, Zimmermann! Paul Zimmermann, to be precise!" The longer she thought about it, the more it made sense. The brutal murder. Nina's debt and her desperation to find money – enough to drive her to theft. The ruthlessness of Esposito and Ryan's attackers. The German accent. It had to be Zimmermann.

Castle's confusion didn't lessen, and why would it? Luckily for him, luckily for all of them really, there hadn't been a case involving Paul Zimmermann in a long time and she had actually hoped that he had finally found his match and had disappeared somewhere on the bottom of the Hudson, but now she wasn't so sure any more. So with a sigh she started to explain: "I take it you haven't heard of Paul Zimmermann before?" When Castle just shook his head, she continued in a hushed voice: "There isn't that much known about him. Most of it is word on the street about a German crime boss who's involved in drugs, gambling, prostitution, you name it. I know Ryan …" At the thought of her partner she had to swallow hard. _Please don't let it be the same guys._ Castle gave her a questioning look, but didn't comment on her behavior as she continued: "I know Ryan had a few brush ins with some of his dealers during his time at Narcotics, but even though they arrested quite a few of them, they never managed to trace anything back to Zimmermann himself. Most of them just accepted their sentence without protest, and those who tried to strike a deal were…" She didn't continue and she knew she didn't have to. These things were pretty self-explanatory.

"A German Godfather", Castle whispered in awe.

Kate rolled her eyes and tried to get the conversation back on track: "Zimmermann's men are known for their brutal way of handling outstanding debts, and considering what happened to Nina, it's possible she wasn't able to pay him back." Running through the details of the case quickly once more, she was able to see the inconsistency in her reasoning and mused: "But if it was money they were after, then why not take the valuables in Nina's house?" There was still something missing, some small piece that would help this case make sense. "What _were_ they looking for?"

At that, Castle actually smirked, which made her raise a brow in puzzlement. "I think I might be able to help you out with that question", he grinned and pulled up in front of his apartment.

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Between his aching head and stomach, his double vision, the shaking ground beneath him and the nerve-wracking images of Javier lying in that pool of blood that he just couldn't banish from his mind, Ryan didn't really manage to keep track of time. How long had he been lying on the bottom of the van? Ten minutes? Half an hour? His kidnappers had soon lost interest in him – he couldn't blame them, he probably wasn't all that entertaining in his current condition – and had begun talking quietly in their foreign tongue. The more he listened, the surer Ryan was that he had heard the language before, but it was one word in particular that caught his attention and set his thoughts into motion: _Polizei_.

German. Damn, they must have hit him harder than he'd suspected considering it had taken him that long to figure out why he'd thought both their accent and their native tongue sounded so familiar. Then again, it had been several years since he had last been involved in an investigation where their suspects had spoken German, and it wasn't really a memory he'd been keen on digging up; especially that one case had been haunting him for a long, long time and he'd been more than happy when the memory had finally faded. The dead drug dealer hadn't been a pretty sight, and the lack of evidence leading from him to the men behind his petty drug dealing ring had been nothing else but deeply frustrating. Putting everything he'd ever learned into this one investigation, spending sleepless nights and unnerving days, he'd eventually come close – so goddamn close… and yet not close enough. As the memories came back to him, he forced himself to look up at his two captors again, but he was pretty sure he hadn't seen them before. That didn't mean they weren't working for Zimmermann – there weren't that many German speaking killers in New York as far as he knew, and if he remembered correctly, Zimmermann was known for surrounding himself with hit men from his home country. Very _efficient_ hit men, he thought with a shudder as he recalled the times one of his suspects was ready to talk and was found dead shortly after, not to speak of the dismembered dealer who had probably served as a warning to others not to get caught.

But there hadn't been anything resembling Zimmermann's M.O. for so long, he'd assumed the guy had disappeared, one way or another. Or hoped, rather. But if Nina had indeed been taken out by his henchmen, she had been in way deeper into something illegal than any of her so-called friends had hinted or possibly even known.

He'd been lost so deep into thought that the sudden pain in his ribs caught him completely by surprise and made it impossible to hold back a tormented gasp. The guy with the boots, Tank Top, pulled his foot back with a sadistic grin and said something to the other man that made Ryan shudder. He didn't understand the whole sentence, but there was a name at the end of it that did ring a bell, unfortunately. And the tone of voice left Ryan with no doubt that the guy wasn't too pleased with his sudden discovery. "_Wusst ich doch, dass ich den Namen schon mal gehört hab! Das ist doch der Bulle, der Herbert hat auffliegen lassen!"_ Herbert. Herbert Mayer. Of course. That had been the name of the dealer Ryan had busted, the guy that had ended up in very, _very_ small pieces as if somebody really had taken his time with him.

Had he been afraid before? That was nothing compared to the all-encompassing fear he felt now that he had solid proof that these were, in fact, Zimmermann's men. He was so screwed.


	11. Chapter 11

For a second, Kate just stared at the blonde girl in utter disbelief. Yes, she had had any intention of returning to the Domino Sugar Refinery to search for her, but she had never expected to see her again this fast in the middle of her companion's living room with a blanket around her shoulders and a cup of hot tea between her fingers.

"Martha was so sweet to offer me a hot beverage", the girl explained at Castle's own surprised look. "Thank you for taking me in."

Did Kate just imagine things, or did Castle's face actually turn a little bit red at the girl's comment? "That's the least I could do for what you did for Javier", he answered her, which instantly led to her asking: "The Detective that got shot… Is he… will he live?"

"It's too early to tell", Kate muttered and took in the girl's appearance while adding: "But if it hadn't been for you, he'd already be dead." The girl was pretty, with a slim, even face and a well-proportioned, slender body, but she looked extremely tired, not to say exhausted, and the deep shadows underneath her eyes as well as the hollow cheeks seemed to underline the hardness she had been through. Her first thought was that she had the visual traits of a drug addict, but she was too calm to be high or on a cold turkey. Now that Kate had more time and was in a less panicky state, she was able to estimate the girl's age more precisely; she was not a day older than sixteen, which really made her wonder what she had been doing out at the factory with Christopher, a man at least twice her age. Before she could ask that question though – force of habit – Castle pointed at her and said: "This is Detective Beckett, she's the one working on Nina's case."

At the mention of Nina's name, the girl's expression darkened. "Is she… is she really dead?", she whispered so quietly Kate almost didn't understand her. Her reaction told her two things: One, her presence at the refinery hadn't been a coincidence as she had first expected. Two, this case just took on another level of complicated.

"I am afraid so", Kate responded in an emphatic tone of voice that she didn't have to feign after seeing the girl's sad eyes. She took a step towards her and crouched down in front of her. There were a lot of questions she would have liked to ask: _How did you know Nina and Christopher? What were you doing at the Domino Sugar Refinery? Where are you from? Where are your parents?_, but Kate knew that the most important part right now was to gain the girl's trust (and as she knew Castle, he probably already had interrogated her in that small-talk kind of way), so she smiled up at her and said: "What's your name?"

It was obvious that the girl had expected something else, but as Kate had hoped, she relaxed visibly and sunk a little bit further into the couch. She looked lost, somehow, and if her accent was any kind of clue to her native country, she was indeed a long way from home. "Mishka", she replied after half a minute and with a deep-drawn sigh that probably meant she had made a decision. Hopefully a decision to trust Kate – with Ryan's life on the line, she really needed any lead she could get. "My name is Mishka Doromov."

"You're from Russia?", Kate guessed.

The girl – Mishka – nodded slowly. "Moscow", she then explained hesitantly.

"That's a long way from New York", Kate remarked and sat down next to her on the couch. The girl didn't seem to mind, though she did turn her gaze back to the tea as if the liquid would somehow help her tell her story.

"Living in Russia, it is not… It is…" Mishka halted for a second, then tried a different approach: "My father has been between jobs for as long as I can remember. After my mother died…" She paused again and seemed to gather the strength to carry on. Kate didn't push her, and she was grateful that Castle somehow managed to blend in with his surroundings and didn't interrupt her. "After my mother died, Vodka became his best friend. I… I wanted to leave, and I needed the money, so I… a friend of mine… told me about this, ah, _tochka_", Mishka went on and Kate nodded to signal she understood. Her knowledge of the Russian language was sufficient enough to translate the word immediately: A place where _something_ happened, something significant in a certain context. "She had made a lot of money there, and she introduced me to Mikesh, her… ah…" She looked at Kate and spoke another Russian term: "_kot_". Pimp. _God, that poor girl_, she thought, but nodded again and beckoned Mishka to go on. "Mikesh, he was very impressed. My mother had taught me English, and he said with my skills he could provide me with a job overseas. I just wanted out, so I said… I agreed…" For a few heartbeats, the immensity of her decision and what had followed afterwards seemed to overwhelm her and Kate gave her the time she needed, even though she was pretty sure that she already knew the next part of her story. She had heard it far too many times.

"He… he lied", Mishka suddenly went on a lot more agitated than before. "Of course he did, that _tupoy_ _ublyudok_!" Kate had to think shortly about those words as she hadn't heard them in a long time, but she was pretty sure the direct translation was something like "lying" or "stupid bastard". "700 Dollars! That's what I was worth to him! 700 Dollars for him and I ended up on some _tupoy_ ship in some _spyorti_ container with all those other girls and those _svolochs_ touching us… and …" Her voice trailed off, and Kate didn't try to encourage her to continue this particular part of her story. It was pretty obvious what had happened and this was neither the time nor the place for Mishka to relive those memories. There were other details that were a lot more important right now.

"Do you remember if there was anything on the ship or on that container, Mishka? A logo, a name, anything?", she tried to change course, but the girl just shook her head. "Drugs", she explained. "I don't remember getting on that ship or into that container, and I don't remember getting off."

Of course she wouldn't. Whoever – _Zimmermann, Zimmermann, Zimmermann_ – had acquired her would be very careful in case she or any of the other girls escaped. She knew Zimmermann had his fingers in a lot of illegal activities throughout the city, and human trafficking was probably just another one of his … ventures… Damn, they could really use the name of that ship right now! Kate held back a sigh and went on: "When you got off, what happened then?"

The girl seemed to think about the question for a minute; or maybe she was just trying to gather up the courage to continue. "There were two men, but I… I was blindfolded. I didn't see them. They …"

"It's okay, Mishka", Kate encouraged her. That was probably the part were Zimmermann's men had brought her and the other girls to the place where they would be sold or forced to _work_. "Did they say anything?" Even if they did, she probably didn't understand it unless she was proficient in the German language too, Kate pondered, but was proven wrong, when Mishka replied with a nod: "Something about taking a … a share of the pie? I am sorry, I was still so dazed. But I am sure they spoke about a pie. I remember because I was hungry."

This time, Kate couldn't control her emotions and burst out: "They were speaking _English_?!" Though Mishka looked taken aback, she gave a nod of assent. "Yes, but when I begged for a piece of that pie, they just laughed and then one of them …" She fell silent again shortly before whispering: "Then one of them slapped me and said that I should not speak unless spoken to. They locked me into a dark room and then left. When the door opened again not long after, I was really afraid, but this time it was a woman who entered, Nina. She told me not to be afraid and that she had come to get me out of here. I don't… I don't recall much, but it looked like some kind of warehouse, and there were a lot of containers, so we must have still been at the harbor. Christopher waited in a car and they asked me to get in the trunk – everything happened so fast and I just wanted to get away from there and then we came to her house in the middle of the night and she was so nice and concerned and made me something to eat. I could see that her boyfriend wasn't all that happy, and they asked me to stay in the kitchen for a short while and went into another room. They talked, but I… I couldn't hear what they said and I didn't care either at that point, and then Christopher took me with him out to that eerie place before morning and Nina said she'd come and get me later. She said the less I knew, the better. There was something she needed to sort out, she explained, and then she promised me we'd go to the police and get those … bastards, she said, behind bars. I was just so tired and frightened and I just… I just… I just wanted to go home."

Kate placed a hand on Mishka's leg and caressed her in a comforting gesture. She couldn't even begin to understand what that poor girl had been through, and she just wanted to do something, anything really, to make her feel better. So far away from home just to be shipped around like some kind of cargo… But even though she felt sorry for the Russian girl, her mind, trained after so many years as a homicide detective, was already working furiously. How were the guys that had taken Mishka for herself and the bastards that had attacked Ryan and Esposito connected? And how did Nina get involved in all of this? These weren't questions Mishka could answer for her, though, so she added them to her mental murder board and continued her inquiry: "Do you remember when this happened?"

"It was… I didn't really keep count, but I think it was five days ago. We've been hiding out there ever since."

_Five days ago_, Kate thought and held the information up against her timeline. Castle seemed to be following her lead, because he muttered "So Sunday…" in a pensive voice.

"And you didn't see Nina anymore after you went with Christopher?", she went on.

"Oh, I did", Mishka exclaimed. "She came out to the factory a few times. At first, she seemed really… ah, glad, I think the word is, happy, but then the day before yesterday, she seemed tense, nervous. I just knew something was wrong, but Christopher didn't want to talk to me. He just said I should hide, and then they both went away. I know I shouldn't have betrayed his trust, but I was so afraid and they were acting so strange that I … I decided to find out what was going on, and I found this", she said and began digging in the pocket of her jeans. When she produced a piece of paper, Kate could feel how Castle held his breath, and she couldn't absolve herself of her own jumpiness. Maybe this was it. The missing piece of the puzzle. She reached out for the paper with shaking fingers, unfolded it and stared at the content for at least half a minute before handing it to Castle.

"_We know about the girl and we have the evidence to prove your involvement. We know you can't go to the police, but we offer you the possibility to pay your way out of this one. Await further_", he read out aloud. The text had been written on a typewriter, but it was apparently unfinished, which made Kate think that it was some kind of a draft. But still the message was quite clear. "The plot thickens", Castle remarked and put the paper down on the table in front of him.

"It was lying wadded in Christopher's jacket", Mishka explained. "And I'm pretty sure the 'girl' is me."

Kate nodded more to herself than to Mishka and mused: "That sure does explain why they didn't go to the police at once. Think about it, Castle – both of them having money problems, then stumbling upon this whole human trafficking thing… They must have thought it was a goldmine." The only problem with that theory was that it still didn't explain Zimmermann's henchmen. And worse: It didn't lead them to Ryan.

"Yes, I can see the appeal", Castle muttered, "But answer me this: Who were they blackmailing? And how did they find out about it in the first place?"

For a second, Kate allowed herself to close her eyes and just to think. Details, it was all about the details. Behind her inner eyes, she drew the murder board up again, went over every piece of information she and her team had gathered. There had to be a connection. Nina Carrera – murdered. Christopher Warren – murdered. Lila Jensen – dead end. Sarah Murdock – dead end. Martin and Richard Wellerby… Martin and Richard Wellerby…

"Of course!", she cried out in the exact same instant Castle exclaimed: "I've got it!"

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"Get up!", the sadistic guy commanded once the van had gotten to a halt, and he underlined his orders with another hard kick to Ryan's stomach. Not the first since they had found out _which_ cop they had managed to take captive, and surely not the last one either. Ryan had all intentions of being accommodating, but getting up was really easier said than done with his hands tied up and the lack of space. His knees feeling like jelly and the cabin spinning like some crazy ride on Coney Island didn't help at all.

While Tank Top apparently enjoyed watching him struggle to just get to his knees, the Giant wasn't as patient: He grabbed Ryan's black leather jacket and simply pulled him into an upright position, which – apart from making his back scream in aching protest – more than anything showed the Detective how strong the guy was. Another discouraging detail for an escape attempt.

The side door was opened from the outside and allowed Ryan a glance at the third attacker, and though he hadn't met this one personally before today, the long, rough face with the hollow cheeks and those small, beady eyes that lent him a look of constant agitation were quite familiar to him. He had seen him on composite sketch drawn after the directions of a witness; that witness had ended up disappearing shortly after.

Unfortunately, the surroundings behind Beady Eyes were not as clearly visible, which made it hard to tell anything about their location. It was almost completely dark outside, which was uncommon for New York and had to mean that they were in some deserted part of the city. The only lights he could see seemed to be a fair way off, but they were enough to illuminate the outline of several large structures close by… warehouses, maybe?

Ryan didn't get the time to focus further on what he thought were buildings; Tank Top left the van with one dexterous movement, while the Giant took a tight hold of Ryan's right shoulder and forced him outside with a grunted: "Let's go, pretty boy". Ryan staggered out of the vehicle and was instantly met by the sight of his own gun and the words: "Give me an excuse. I dare you!" spoken by Beady Eyes; apparently, Tank Top had used the short time it had taken Ryan to leave the van to explain his identity to the driver. Great. The Giant muttered something in German that made the other man lower the weapon again, but Ryan didn't really find any comfort in his current safety. The point where they had no further need for him would come sooner or later, though he prayed for later, much later. The longer he managed to stay alive, the more time did he buy Beckett and Castle to come and find him. The thought of his two partners brought back unwanted visions of Javier and it took him a few seconds to push them back into the back of his mind again – he couldn't go that way right now, he just couldn't. Whatever had happened to his friend, he would find out at one point, and he could deal with it then. For now he just found comfort in the knowledge that Javier Esposito was one of the toughest guys he had ever known and that he had been through worse than this. That would have to suffice for now.

As the Giant gave him another shove, Ryan stumbled forwards. Slowly, his eyes got used to the darkness and he could make out more details as they were walking from the van to one of the large buildings. Smoke stacks towered above them, and there were smaller structures to his right that he couldn't make out. He thought he heard the sound of water gurgling, and when he looked into the night to his left the ground seemed to glitter. One of the harbors? Probably. But there were many, and without further landmarks it was difficult to pinpoint his exact location. He tried to turn his head to see if maybe he was lucky enough to make out the shape of one of the bridges leading onto Manhattan, but his curiosity just earned him a hard blow between the shoulder blades that almost made him lose his balance again and revived that blasted headache. Then they reached a door – metal, no handle or lock, but keypad on the side, Ryan noted – that was opened from the inside, and a shadow on the other side mumbled a word in German that Tank Top reacted to with an angry snarl and a similar word.

The corridor on the other side was dimly lit and lined with various doors to both his left and right – offices? –, but they passed them by and left through a larger doorway at the far end of the hallway. Ryan's warehouse theory proved to be correct, though he could only see a small fraction of the presumably quite extensive storage room. The roof, held up by transversal metal beams with one layer of insulation visible between them, was far above him and allowed the room to hold several stories of cargo. They went by high stacks of large wooden crates and smaller metal containers with different logos, some of which he had seen before; especially a golden star with the words _Eastern Gold Starline_ written underneath caught his attention. He'd heard that name before and it had been quite recently, but where?

He didn't have the time to think more about it. A tall man with short, black hair and clad in black jeans and a t-shirt came to meet them. A young girl in skinny jeans and a blue tank top stood by his side, but as she was staring down at the floor, he was unable to guess her age. He did notice several bruises on her naked arms, and her shirt had some dark red spots on it like… blood? _Oh God_. Ryan didn't know anything about her – who she was, why she was here – but his first instinct was to rush to her aide nonetheless. Beady Eyes must have discerned how Ryan suddenly tensed up, because he shot him a warning glance that seemed to repeat the message he had given him before: _Just give me an excuse_.

The man next to the girl gave Ryan a quick once-over before turning towards the Giant and asking in English with a slight Slavic accent: "You did not find her?"

Her? Who where they talking about? It couldn't be Nina Carrera and last he checked, Christopher Warren was a _he_, so who…

The Giant retorted: "Slight change of plans" and then barfed an order that made the man scuttle away with the girl as quickly as his legs could carry him: "Lock that bitch up and gather your men!"

_Your men?_ This was getting weirder and weirder, Ryan pondered. As far as he knew, Zimmermann didn't work with anyone else, but then again – he had probably only discovered a tiny fragment of the crime boss' ventures. Was the girl part of these undertakings? If so, how did she – and the one they had been searching for at the sugar refinery – fit in? Ryan's thoughts wandered back to the Eastern Gold Starline logo and he turned around to look at it again, half expecting another strike for his nosiness – but no one stopped him. Tank Top was staring intently at a cellphone, Beady Eyes was leaning against one of the crates eying him narrowly and the Giant just stood there calmly and waited for the Slav to return. Ryan did remember the way back and out of the storage facility, but he doubted that he could run fast enough with his hands on his back to outpace the three men. Not to forget the guy who had opened the door. Oh, and the guy with the girl. So for now he would have to settle for the possibility to gather as much information as possible, starting with the name of that shipping line and potential hiding places if he actually succeeded in escaping. So he tried to imprint every little detail in his mind, how high the crates were stacked, where there was room enough to slip through, anything that might help him hide long enough for the cavalry to come. And that gold star… Hey, hadn't those brothers just bought a few shipping lines in Eastern Europe? Maybe they–

He didn't get to finish his thought. The Slav returned with three other guys in tow and now looked both expectantly and somehow tense at the three Germans. _Almost as if they're afraid_, Ryan thought with a side glance at Beady Eyes who was still holding the Glock between his fingers. His instincts were right, but even if he had wanted to do something about what was to ensue, he wouldn't have been fast enough. The Giant said in a very quiet tone of voice: "_Jetzt_" and his two men fired their weapons instantly and with deadly precision. The four bangs echoed loudly through the warehouse and were followed by the sound of four bodies dropping to the floor and… a scream? Ryan wasn't quite sure as his ears were still ringing, but he thought he heard a cry from somewhere, just for a heartbeat. The girl?

"W-what the…", he whispered and stared in disbelief at the four dead guys on the ground. Headshots. Just like an execution. "_What the fuck was that for?!_" The words left his mouth before he could contemplate about the wisdom of saying anything, but the Giant was polite enough to provide him with an answer nonetheless.

"That was damage control", the man said in the same tranquil voice, before he grasped his arm and pushed him past the bodies deeper into the storage room. "A concept I believe you to be quite familiar with, Detective Ryan."

Considering that Ryan had seen Zimmermann's definition of "damage control" a few times before, there wasn't really any arguing with his captor, and he wasn't surprised when he heard the Giant order Tank Top back to the sugar refinery; probably to get rid of Christopher and whatever else might be hidden there. That was exactly Zimmermann's M.O. – any ties, any connections, anything that could hint towards the German crime boss would disappear before the night was over. And if Beckett didn't hurry, that "anything" would include Ryan.

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	12. Chapter 12

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It didn't take Kate long to abuse Castle's projector as a provisional murder board once again, while her companion used his laptop to fetch information that they had discarded before without knowing how vital it had been to the case.

"So", she began and drew a box for the murdered woman. "Here we have Nina – she owes money to Sarah and probably someone else who she is a lot more afraid of than Sarah. Enough to steal from her employers. Unfortunately she is discovered, which leaves her quite desperate."

"And here we have Christopher", Castle took over and marked the other murder victim on the board. "Also in financial troubles. He worked for the Eastern Gold Starline, a shipping company –"

"that was bought by Wellerby Shipping half a year ago in the company's acquisition of Eastern European shipping lines", Kate finished his sentence.

Castle pointed at the headlines they had looked at earlier today without thinking about their significance. "Which turned out to be a fiasco for the company. Stocks dropped, investment bankers lost their trust in the Wellerby name, consultants recommended to sell them off again… and still they kept their newest acquisitions."

"Makes you wonder why", Kate mused though the answer was clear as the light of day.

"There must be a reason human trafficking is as popular as it is today", Castle presented their theory. "And for a company in financial need, a little illegal, but well-paid activity might very well be the proverbial lifeline."

"But Christopher, probably working aboard one of the smuggling vessels, got onto them and decided to mend his wages a little bit", Kate went on and drew a line from Christopher to Nina. "He needed evidence, though, evidence that connected our well-paid Wellerby's to the illegal operation, so he established contact to someone close to the brothers, someone who wouldn't say no to the extra cash."

Castle made the connection between Christopher and Lila and commented on it by saying: "So our poor Lila was just a means to an end. No wonder she was pissed – excuse my language", he added with a side glance at Mishka. Kate followed his gaze and discovered that the girl had fallen asleep on the couch, which really wasn't all that surprising after everything she had been through. Kate would have liked to put her into protective custody as quickly as possible, but in order to do so, she would have had to go through the precinct which probably meant alerting the snitch to Mishka's presence.

"So Nina gathers evidence that shows Martin and Richard's involvement in the human trafficking organization", Castle carried on, but suddenly grew silent and looked over their board. "But… here's what I don't get. How does Mishka fit into the picture? According to her tale, she was being held somewhere at one of New York's harbors by two men who clearly were trying to double-cross the Wellerby's by taking one of the girls for themselves. Why would Nina and Christopher need evidence of that?"

That was a valid point and Kate thought about it for a minute or two. Nina and Christopher had known about the ship that had transported the girls into the country, and maybe Nina had followed Martin and Richard out to the harbor where they wanted to inspect their… _cargo_. That explained the location – but why then follow two of their employees? Why risk their lives to safe Mishka? Unless…

Unless Martin and Richard were the ones who had done the double-crossing. Castle seemed to have reached the same conclusion, because he drew another box above the Wellerby's, put a question mark inside it and said: "How about this? The ships that did the smuggling were, in fact, owned by the Wellerby's. But the girls weren't theirs to play with."

It made sense, and Kate nodded in agreement: "Their company was going downhill and they probably needed money to keep up their lifestyle, so they found themselves a business partner –"

"One with a doubtful reputation", Castle interjected. None of them said it, but Kate was pretty sure they were thinking about the same name right now.

"Someone in dire need of a cover for one of his operations", Kate reasoned. "Martin and Richard bought the Eastern European shipping lines necessary to transport the girls –"

"And in turn they got help with their financial troubles", Castle concluded. "But they got greedy and thought – why not take a little slice of the _pie_ themselves, to use their own words?"

"What they didn't expect were Nina and Christopher coming along and finding evidence of their little game. They probably saw Martin and Richard bring Mishka to that warehouse and took their chance." For a heartbeat, Kate enjoyed the pieces falling into place, though she knew there were still large chunks missing. "Considering that Nina paid Sarah on Tuesday, the blackmail was probably a success. But then something went wrong…"

Castle walked to her side and they both stared at the board intently. There wasn't any more evidence right now, and whatever followed now wasn't anything else but conjectures, but they were better than nothing. "The way Nina had been tortured suggests that someone wanted to get hands on that evidence. And considering that Christopher was murdered by our German friends, it stands to reason that it wasn't Martin and Richard who tried to retrieve whatever our dead couple had found."

"You still believe it's this Zimmermann guy who's behind all this?", Castle asked with the tiniest trace of doubt in his voice. "I know you said he's into prostitution, but human trafficking is a bit more extensive than that. And even if he's behind it, you don't think Martin and Richard went to him and told them they had been caught double-crossing him? So how would he have found out?"

How indeed… For the umpteenth time, Kate ran the case through her mind. It had to be there. It just _had_. And of course it was. "Nina's debt", she exclaimed triumphantly. "If Nina did indeed owe Zimmermann money and then suddenly paid it all back, he would have gotten suspicious. If he knew that she was working for Martin and Richard, then he could have found out in this way."

"That's a pretty big if." She could hear that Castle still wasn't convinced, and she couldn't blame him. Without her normal resources at hand, it was neigh impossible to prove any of this, but it was still better than nothing. And one thing was clear: Martin and Richard were somehow connected to the guys who had abducted Ryan, which meant that they could point her in the right direction. Though how she could talk to them without the snitch at the precinct knowing would be a challenge… Maybe if…

She hadn't really thought about anyone else being involved in this, so when she suddenly heard Martha's voice, she turned around with a start.

"You should see this", Martha said and turned on the TV in the living room. Kate registered with surprise that it was already two in the morning – or at least that was what the clock down in the corner of the screen told her – which meant they had been preoccupied with their investigation for over three hours. And it had been more than six hours since they had left the Domino Sugar Refinery. More than enough time, apparently, to set it ablaze. The pictures shown by the news channel would have spoken for themselves, even without the news ticker below reading "_Fire at the Domino Sugar Refinery in Brooklyn_", and they gave Kate instant goose bumps.

"You think –", Castle began, but she didn't even let him finish his question before muttering in a toneless voice: "Yes. I do think." So that was what they needed time for, Kate suddenly understood, that's why they wanted her to halt the investigation. They needed time to get rid of evidence, time to erase any trace of their involvement in this case. "They've initiated damage control".

"And by 'they' you mean…", Castle started to ask and was interrupted once more as the full force of the implications of Zimmermann's damage control hit her and she exclaimed: "Oh God!". If it was indeed Zimmermann who tried to cut all ties to this operation, he wouldn't leave the people who had made the whole human trafficking part possible for him unharmed. She had to warn Martin and Richard before it was too late and she lost her only lead to Ryan.

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Castle had not been pleased, but this situation she had to handle herself. She had no idea whether her speculations held any truth, and if she had allowed him to come along and was wrong, she would have endangered his life as well as her own. And she couldn't live with that. But even as she snuck up on the impressive Wellerby mansion in the cover of night, past the large pool area and closer to the backside of the house, she had a hard time forgetting the hurt expression on his rugged features.

"Listen, I need you here!", she had tried to explain. "I don't want to go in there if I don't absolutely have to, and if Mishka remembers anything at all that might lead us to Ryan, I need you by her side so you can tell me!" It not only _was_ an excuse, it sounded like one as well – Martha could have spoken with Mishka and contacted them, but the fact that she actually was trying to make up an excuse to avoid Castle tagging along seemed to be enough to convince him that he had to sit this one out. No, he was not happy, and she would surely hear for this later (at least she hoped she would), but right now she was just grateful that he saw reason for once. All those other times, following her into the lion's den, getting shot at, getting hurt, and still he never left her side…

"You are one crazy guy, Castle", she whispered to herself and used the cover of a box tree to come into the immediate proximity of the house. When they had paid the Wellerby brothers a visit, she had noticed the various security arrangements that protected the property, and though she had probably missed a few of them (breaking and entering wasn't her usual job, after all), she felt confident enough that she would make it into the house without being arrested. Once inside… well, that was a different problem and she would deal with it when the time came. If she could just meet up with one of the brothers without anyone noticing…

She had only seen a small part of the extensive mansion and could only guess which rooms were located behind the windows she was now facing. All of them were covered by curtains, but considering that none of them were barred, there was probably nothing important behind them that would warrant an instant alarm. Or so she hoped. It was weird… She had expected to see security guards patrolling the area, but there had been none. Luckily for her, of course, but it still made her wonder.

_No time_, she told herself to bring her worries to a halt. Right now, there weren't any other options; if Zimmermann was already engaging in damage control, it was only a matter of time before Ryan wasn't of any use to him anymore, and she needed to find him before that happened. So with a last, scrutinizing look Kate closed the gap between the box tree and the window and found the small device that hopefully would help her get into the house. Yes, it was evidence, and no, she was not supposed to use it for her own personal gain, but it wasn't like she intended to steal anything. Usually, the end didn't justify the means, but with lives at stake she decided that appropriation of evidence and B&E were quite acceptable means.

It worked. She could almost not believe her own luck; then again, after a day like this one that had been completely ruled by Murphy's Law, it would just have been plain unfair without any luck at all. As silently and elegantly as she was able to – and here Ryan and Esposito said Yoga classes were pointless! – she pushed the window open and climbed over the sill. It was dark inside and the moonlight only reached a few feet into the room, but it was enough to show Kate that she had been even luckier than she'd hoped: It seemed to be a guestroom with a single bed standing to the right of the window and a desk to the left. As far as she could see, there was no alarm system on the inside, or at least there were no visible wires or other devices. Carefully, she drew the curtains shut again. Then she waited a few heartbeats until her eyesight had gotten used to the darkness, before she tiptoed through the room with her hands outstretched. She could see darker shapes, a small coffee table and a couch, a drawer, but she wanted to be absolutely sure that she didn't knock a vase or something else over that wasn't visible in the shady gray. After a minute, she reached the wall opposite to the window and used her fingertips to locate the door. It wasn't locked – why would it have been inside their own house? – and fortunately it didn't creak when she gently pressed it open and slid through the crack. Now where to? She had entered a large hallway, but as far as she could tell from the few details the lack of light allowed her to gather, it wasn't the one she had been in before. Maybe this was the guest wing of the mansion? She decided to go left where she expected the main entrance to be, but she hadn't even managed to turn around, when she heard the sound. She didn't recognize it, but it told her that she wasn't alone. Options shot through her head – turning back, running away? No, that would mean giving up on Ryan. Attacking? She had no idea who the other person was or where he (or she?) was standing. Saying something? But what if the other person hadn't noticed her yet? She would just give away her position for nothing...

The choice was made for her, when the voice of the younger Wellerby brother reached her ears and was accompanied by the well-known _click_ that told her not to make any sudden movement. "Turn around. Slowly", Martin said. He was standing to her left, though how he had found her so quickly was beyond her. She did as he had asked and blinked a few times when he turned on a flashlight and pointed the beam directly at her face.

"Detective… Beckett?" The confusion in his voice was real, but he lowered neither the gun, a Beretta 92, nor the light after his discovery. Well, she would have probably done the same in his situation. Now what? She had found a Wellerby brother and quite clearly he wasn't dead yet, so what to tell him?

_A good offense is always the best defense_, she thought and said bluntly: "Zimmermann's men are coming to kill you."

His reaction told her several important things: One, he was actually working with Zimmermann, because there was no confusion at the crime boss' name whatsoever. Two, the puzzlement did emerge only after he had thought about the word "kill" for a heartbeat or two, which meant that he had no idea the whole human trafficking operation had gone down the hill. Three, he didn't trust her. No surprise there. She had to give him something more, something that he would have to believe. "Listen, Martin, we have very little time. Zimmermann has lost faith in your little operation and has already disposed of Nina Carrera and Christopher Warren after he got wind of them blackmailing you."

Perfect. Martin's reaction was exactly what she had hoped for – he lowered the gun and muttered: „How do you… how do you know all this?" No denial – that probably meant he had thought about Zimmermann's involvement in Nina's murder himself. "Now he's getting rid of any evidence of his participation in this, and I have every reason to believe that he's going after you and your brother next."

She couldn't see Martin's reaction to those words. The lights in the hallway flickered on and blinded both of them, but if she had had any hopes of disarming Martin due to the surprise effect, they were taken from her, when Richard cocked a gun behind her and exclaimed: "Oh please, Detective! Considering that we're the perfect cover for him, I don't see any reason for him to act against us."

Kate couldn't help but snort at that. Clearly the Wellerby's had no idea who they were dealing with. "No reason?", she hissed and turned her head to look Richard into the eyes. "You don't think a housekeeper and her boyfriend getting on to you would be reason enough for a man like Zimmermann to abandon ship? You don't think stealing from his _cargo_ would be reason enough for him to get rid of you?" Bull's eye. She could see how even the stoic Richard Wellerby flinched at her words. But it wasn't enough yet. They needed an incentive, some solution to their sudden problem, and so she offered it to them: "But I can protect you. Tell me where Zimmermann's men are hiding and I'll take you into protective custody."

She could see that Richard wasn't going to fall for her proposal, but the tiniest whimper behind her told her that Martin had taken the bait, and she turned back towards him to push him over the brink with one of her icy stares.

"Richard, maybe we should –", he began. He never got to finish that sentence. Kate saw the small, red dot on his forehead the moment she faced him, but her "GET DOWN!" came too late and even as she let herself fall down onto the carpet, she could feel hot blood spray onto her face. Her first thought was _He killed his own brother!_, but then Richard slumped down next to her with a panicky expression in his once calm eyes and he huffed: "Oh… oh God!"

Another shot hit a vase on a small table next to her and let it shatter in a thousand pieces that came raining down on her and the older Wellerby brother. The attacker had to be standing on the far end of the hallway, near the main entrance, and the red beam meant that he was using laser sight. The vase was probably just for show, which could only mean that he intended to play with them. Good – she'd be dead already if the situation had been different. With a forceful movement, Kate knocked the vase table over and brought it between her and the sniper, covering Richard as best as possible while reaching for Martin's Beretta and firing two shots in the general direction of their attacker. That was when she smelled it.

Smoke. Damn! „We have to get out!", she whispered and pulled the table with her down the hall as she moved back towards the room she had been in before. The next shot put a large hole into her cover and made her move even faster – opening the door, ushering Richard inside, jumping in herself and closing it with a loud thud. They knew they were here – no need for silk paws anymore. Finding the key with flying fingers, she locked the door behind her and turned towards the window.

"They… they killed Martin", Richard muttered and stared back at the door as if he had only now understood the full meaning of what had just happened. "Oh my God, they killed Martin!"

As sorry as Kate was for his loss (well, almost), there was no time for grief now, so she shouted: "And they are going to kill you too, if you don't get a grip!" It didn't exactly work as she had hoped for, but she did get a reaction from the older Wellerby. The man lifted his own weapon and snarled in a very low, very dangerous tone of voice: "This is your fault. This is all your fault, you nosy bitch!". Kate didn't see any other choice – with the hit men on the other side of the door and this psychopath with a gun in front of her, there was only one way she could go. Everything in her screamed not to escape without the Wellerby brother, but her survival instinct overruled every other sentiment and she ran towards the still open window, tore the curtains away and surmounted the sill with a dive roll worthy of a stunt girl. The landing was a lot less elegant and her back screamed in protest as she fell hard on the stones fencing in a flowerbed. But there was no time to lick her wounds, not now. She could hear the door being broken down, could hear Richard yell something just before firing off his gun, could hear the unmistakable _pop_ of a suppressed rifle and the _thud_ with which a body landed on a carpet. The gut-wrenching _thud_ with which her last hope of finding Ryan disappeared.

She wanted to swear in raging anger, to let out a frustrated scream, to cry out her desperation… but she did none of those things. Her training just took over and her legs carried her away from the house as if on autopilot. The smell of smoke had grown stronger outside and the former blackness had been set alight with an orange glow that made it easier for her to find her way – and _a lot_ easier for her pursuers to see her. She managed to throw herself behind the box tree just in time to see a bundle of leaves be wiped away right next to her head. Now what? There were at least five meters between the bush and the next hiding spot and though she was fast, she knew she couldn't outrun a bullet.

The decision whether or not to move was taken from her when she heard a German order echo through the night: "_KEINE ZEIT! RAUS!_". Admittedly, her German was a little bit rusty, but judging by the growing fire the words probably meant: _No time! Get out!_ No time? As far as she could see, the flames were already licking high on the roof of the mansion, but it would still take a while before the situation got dangerous for those inside, unless...

Unless they wanted to make sure that nothing whatsoever remained of Martin and Richard's legacy. Fuck. If her theory held true, she would _have_ to move as well and get as far away from the house as possible. At this range, the blast would still be strong enough to kill her. But when she tried to leave her box tree, another branch was torn to shreds, this time from the other side. How many of them were there?! Even without knowing the answer, she was well aware of the fact that this path was closed to her. Fuck. Fuck, fuck, _fuck_! By now she could feel the heat of the burning building behind her – there was no time. She would just have to risk it! Kate took one deep breath and catapulted herself forward, only to bounce back as the ground in front of her feet exploded. As she crouched back behind her hideout, she could clearly see the red laser pointer on the grass in front of her. They were trying to force her back to the house. How much time had passed since the command? One minute, two? Couldn't be long now. Had to do something. Anything. She didn't hesitate for a second when the idea finally hit her. She could still see the red dot on the way towards the hedge, but there was nothing to indicate they kept an eye out for the direction along the mansion's outer wall, so when she saw her chance, she took it. Darting forward without looking back she left her box tree, sidestepped several times as she heard the _pop_ through the sound of rustling flames and finally just let herself fall as she reached her destination.

Not a moment too soon. A fraction of a second before her head dipped under, she thought she heard an all-encompassing roar, then the cold water embraced her and deafened out whatever sound the explosion made. For a heartbeat, an orange streak turned the night as light as day and blinded her even beneath the waves, and she thought she could feel a shudder go through the water of the pool; whatever the hit men had used to rig the house with had to be incredibly powerful and had probably wiped out the entire structure. Kate tried to orientate herself, to find one of the walls, and she reached it just in time: A large chunk of … something crashed into the water next to her, missing her only by a few feet and causing her to yank her arms up to protect her head. More objects broke through the surface, but somehow her luck had turned again and all she felt was a sharp pain in her wrist when a brick hit her and sank to the bottom underneath her. By then her lungs were screaming for air, and she risked coming up long enough to draw in a deep breath before diving below once more. Had the men seen her escape into the pool? And if they had, would they risk hanging around long enough to be discovered to ensure that she didn't make it? No, she decided, that wouldn't fit their M.O. The neighbors would have called the authorities by now, and considering the location of the Wellerby mansion it wouldn't take them long to reach it. Which meant she would have to be gone by then, too, so she wasn't drawn into their investigation. Kate kept holding her breath and followed the length of the wall under water until she reached the other side of the pool and hurriedly climbed out in the midst of the debris from the explosion. She didn't spent one precious second to look at the ruins of the formerly impressive mansion – she had seen firsthand how a building looked after a bomb had gone off and felt no need to relive the memories of that day. She just ran from the heat and the smoke and the destruction until she reached her car that she had parked a fair way off from the Wellerby's in order to avoid detection. Once there she quickly lost the wet clothes and jumped into spare ones she kept in the trunk, sat down behind the wheel and drove on. She did all that still on autopilot with as few thoughts as possible, because every time her mind started to think, it were the same words that haunted her. _You've lost him_. _You've lost Ryan_.

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	13. Chapter 13

**Author's note**

Huh, have you ever felt guilty about how you treat a fictional character in a fictional story? Until quite recently, I haven't. After writing this chapter? Well... I do feel quite sorry for Kev. So here's the main reason this story is rated M - I hope you'll enjoy the chapter anyways ;)

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„Well, well", Beady Eyes said after hanging up and letting the cellphone slide into one of his pockets. Though the words clearly were addressed to the Giant, he spoke in English, which probably wasn't a coincidence, Ryan thought, puzzled. The next sentence explained the untypical behavior, however: "Looks like our Detective Beckett just can't kick the habit."

That made Ryan look up, and though he tried to put on a brave face, he knew the fear he felt inside shimmered through. He had no idea how long he had been here, left alone with his imagination that had grasped the chance to run wild. After shooting their own allies (an act he still found deeply surreal), they had brought him into an office and pushed him down on an uncomfortable metal chair. His heartbeat, already putting a serious strain on his body, had accelerated even more when he had discovered the traces of blood on the concrete around the chair, which made it far too obvious what they had used this location for before, especially when he thought back to the girl with the bloody tank top. Ryan had habitually taken the whole room in – one door, no windows, metal desk with several drawers in one corner, two large filing cabinets and a locker in the other, a single light bulb dangling from the ceiling next to a hook (a _hook?!_) – but had found nothing that could help him with an escape. Still the Giant had found it necessary to procure some zip ties from one of the drawers and used them to secure Ryan's ankles to the chair's legs, before they had left the room without another word. Beady Eyes had given him something that probably should be interpreted as a foreboding glance, then closed the door and left him alone with his grim thoughts and his suddenly far too vivid imagination.

With the immediate threat posed by the German hit men gone, it had been a lot harder not to think about the events of the evening, and especially one question was put on an endless loop inside his head: Was Javier still alive? That second shot… He had only _heard_ it, after all, he had no idea where the man had put the bullet, whether it had even hit his friend. But then again… after what he had witnessed inside this warehouse, the coldblooded execution… Lives didn't seem to count at all for these guys, so which reason should they have had _not_ to aim for any vital parts, he had thought bitterly and tried to focus his concentration on something else. Unfortunately, by then he had been looking down on the ground again, where the blood stains had leapt to his eye. What were they planning on doing with him? It was obvious that Tank Top and Beady Eyes were out for revenge for Herbert Mayer, and considering how bloody that dealer had gone out… Ryan had had to swallow deeply as images of the cut off fingers had flushed through his mind. _Don't think about it. Think about something nice. Find your happy place_, he'd tried to bundle his concentration on something else. The first thing that had come to mind was a heart-warming smile, sunlight radiating off golden blonde hair, Jenny's face. He remembered that day well, a perfect afternoon they had spent at Central Park… He had whispered her name, enjoyed how soft, how soothing it had felt on his tongue, his lips, but before he could find comfort in the memory another thought entirely had forced itself upon him. What if he never saw her again? Never got a chance to tell her how much he loved her just one more time, never got to say goodbye to her? He'd tried to banish those thoughts as well, but soon found that there really wasn't anything else he could focus on, and so his far too active brain had just kept on torturing him right up until the point where the door had been pushed open and Beady Eyes, Tank Top and the Giant had returned, and the sight had done nothing to calm him. Beady Eyes had been talking into a cellphone and had sounded quite agitated. The Giant had carried two large items that he placed on the desk behind Ryan; one looked like some kind of metallic staff with a red handle on one side, almost a meter long and not all that reassuring. The other one Ryan recognized instantly, not that that had made the situation any better: a branch cutter. A fucking _branch_ _cutter_?! The images of the cut-off, bloody fingers had overwhelmed him once more and he couldn't help but gulp. He knew Tank Top had seen the fear in his eyes, because his lips curled into another one of his sadistic grins.

"If she won't listen, she'll have to feel", the guy said with a side glance at the desk. Ryan had to crank his head to keep track of every single one of Tank Top's movements, how his fingers reached out for the branch cutter, how they closed around it. "Or rather… you'll have to feel", the German added as he took up the tool and made a step towards him, then another. He was standing right behind Ryan now and was therefore out of his line of sight, but he was close enough for the detective to hear his breathing. This wasn't good. This was bad. This was really, really bad. Ryan tried to pull his hands away, but the backrest didn't allow for much movement, and when the Giant decided to help his mate out by grabbing Ryan's shoulders and forcing him to hold still, there was nothing he could do but clench his teeth and pray. The cold metal of the cutter touched his skin, almost gently caressing his wrists, his fingers and sending shivers down his spine. If there had ever been a time for begging, it would most certainly have been now, but he knew with an unshakable certainty that nothing he could say would make any other difference than give those men the satisfaction of seeing him grovel. It would happen eventually – he had no idea how painful it would be to lose a finger, but if the pain of cutting yourself deep into the flesh with a bread knife was any indication at all, it was probably more than he (or anyone for that matter) could handle – but he was intent on enduring their _game_ silently for as long as possible. Maybe he was lucky. Maybe the agony would be overwhelming enough to make him lose consciousness quickly. Maybe… maybe that door would be torn open in the next second and Beckett would swoop in with a S.W.A.T. team to get him out of here. Maybe…

The sound of metal screeching on metal reached his ears and made him blink in confusion. Maybe he actually _was_ lucky, because the next thing he knew, his hands were free and the branch cutter landed on the ground with a clank. What the…? Ryan contemplated briefly whether this had made his chances of an escape any better, but the Giant was still holding him and with his legs tied to the chair it would be kinda hard to go anywhere. Tank Top came around to face him, now with a large knife in his hands, but before Ryan could even begin to ponder about the kind of damage that sharp object with the serrated blade could cause (and probably had caused before), his opponent knelt down and sliced the zip ties open. Huh.

"Get up", Tank Top snarled and was already back on his feet and on his way to the filing cabinets. Ryan did as he was told, though he couldn't help but keep his gaze locked on his adversary. What were they planning? If they wanted to make him pay for Kate's insolence, making him lose a finger or two or plunging that knife into his stomach seemed to be perfectly fine options (from their point of view). Instead the Giant confused him even more when he said in that cold, indifferent tone of voice: "Take off your jacket and your shirt."

Ryan's eyes opened wide and for a second he was too confounded to do anything else but stare. His clothes? Why would they… But when he saw what Tank Top produced from one of the drawers, their actions suddenly made a whole more lot of sense. The Giant must have felt how Ryan's body tensed at the sight of the barbed wire, because before Ryan could even think about the option of fighting back or trying to run, he procured a knife of his own and held it to Ryan's throat – close enough that any movement made the razor-sharp blade cut into his skin. "Take it off. Now."

With a knife placed so closely to his carotid artery? Yeah, right. Ryan would have made a snort of derision if he hadn't been so afraid of making the slightest motion. The Giant seemed to have enough sense to know what was going on in his victim's mind, because he lowered the weapon just enough for Ryan to take off the leather jacket very, very slowly, followed by his black vest and the no-longer-so-white shirt, leaving him standing in his bare chest. Ryan would have felt awkward, probably embarrassed, in any situation (except with Jenny in the bedroom), but in the presence of the small roll of barbed wire in Tank Top's hands that feeling turned into a stinging helplessness mixed with no small amount of fear. But still he didn't beg. What good would it do? They had already decided on doing this, and the only thing that might convince them of the stupidity of their plan was a gun to their heads. A gun he didn't have.

"Lift your arms", Tank Top commanded, and the Giant underlined his companion's words by pressing the knife closer to Ryan's throat again. Once more Ryan had to do as he was told, so he stretched his arms out in front of his chest and automatically closed his eyes as his adversary placed the wire around his wrists in several loops and secured them by tightening them unnecessarily brutally. The sharp blades cut into Ryan's skin with a burning sensation and it took all of his self-control not to let out a whimper of pain. He'd expected his lack of a reaction to cause Tank Top to tighten the bonds further, but apart from a look that reminded Ryan of grudging approval nothing happened. At least not until he heard the whirring sound stemming from somewhere above him. As he looked up, Tank Top's indifference suddenly made sense: The hook, that had been dangling high above him before, was on its way down; apparently controlled by remote, as a look at Beady Eyes told him. And it didn't take a genius to figure out what it could and most likely _would_ be used for.

This time, despite better knowledge, Ryan did struggle – it was short and all it earned him was a punch in the midriff, but at least now he wasn't the only one with bruises anymore. Tank Top's cheek had been torn open by his unexpected attempt to break free, and he noted with satisfaction, how blood started draining from the deep gash caused by the barbed wire.

"_Mistkerl_!", Tank Top growled and stared in disbelief at the red liquid on his fingers. When he tried to take his instant revenge, Ryan managed to evade, only to bump into the Giant, who, uncompromising as always, got a hold of his tied up wrists and forced them onto the hook that by now was at the height of Ryan's head. God, this would hurt…

A nod from the Giant made Beady Eyes activate the remote again and all too soon Ryan could feel the wire tighten around his wrists. The pain that followed was almost too much to bear as thousands of tiny needles penetrated his skin, cutting deep into his flesh. It felt as if the skin was being torn from his arms, slowly, bit by bit, and when his feet finally were pulled from the ground and the barbed wire had to hold all of his body weight, there was nothing holding the scream back anymore. At that point, Ryan didn't even care about his pride or his adversaries' satisfaction any more – his mind stopped thinking, allocating every bit of activity to process the millions of signals the nerves on his mistreated wrists were sending. It couldn't have been more than a few seconds before Beady Eyes lowered him down enough for his feet to catch his body weight again, and as the pain slowly ebbed away, his scream turned into a breathless huff followed by a pained sob stemming from deep within his throat. All Ryan could see were red and black dots, fragments of his surroundings, spinning wildly, distorted by tears. Even when the pain finally subsided, the memory was strong enough to make his whole body shudder. He'd never felt anything like this, anything this dolorous before, anything that actually made him wish he'd been shot in that sugar refinery. If only there had been something they'd wanted from him, something he could have told them to make them stop. But there wasn't. And he just knew it wasn't over.

Then the terrible memory faded and allowed him to think at least partly clearly again. He heard someone laugh – two of his captors, to be precise, and he had no doubt _which_ two.

"G-glad… that at least… somebody is… enjoying this", he somehow managed to mutter through clenched teeth. That earned him a surprised look by all three of them, and Beady Eyes, who'd held a cell phone up again – probably to film the torture for Beckett to _enjoy_ – lowered it and commented in his mother tongue: "_Beeindruckend_."

Damn, why couldn't he keep that mouth of his shut?! For a heartbeat he was sure he'd be lifted up again just to see whether he'd still be cocky after a second round, but then Tank Top growled something incomprehensible and went back to the desk.

"Let's see how much you'll enjoy this, pretty boy", he said in English as he reached for the staff and pressed a button in the handle. "If it can be used to beat some manners into those Russian bitches, it should be more than enough to teach you and your colleagues a lesson." Blue sparks flickered to life and allowed Ryan to identify the item as a cattle prod. Not good. He tried to prepare himself for what was to come, but when Tank Top told Beady Eyes to turn the camera on again and then pressed the tip against Ryan's bare side, he was as helpless as before. The jolt that darted through his body felt like whiplashes reaching every corner, every fiber of his body, and there was nothing he could do to keep his body from jerking so violently that his wrists were thrown into the barbed wire once more, making the unbearable anguish return and forcing him to scream again at the top of his lungs.

This time it took a lot longer for the pain to wane, and a lasting throbbing sensation in his side and arms reminded him of what would surely follow again soon. Tank Top was laughing again, but this time there were no smart ass comments left for Ryan to make – he simply let his head sink down on his chest, panting heavily and enjoying the few seconds without agony given to him. God, that hurt. He could feel tears arise in the corner of his eyes once more, but he somehow managed to blink them away – if Beckett saw him break, she would never, ever forgive herself.

"Nothing more to say, Detective?", Tank Top asked in a mocking tone of voice. He didn't even wait for an answer, though – there wouldn't have been one anyways. He just activated the cattle prod again and placed himself so Beady Eyes got a perfect angle for Ryan's next tormented scream.

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Kate knew what the hour was when her cellphone piped up with a gentle vibration. By now Zimmermann would just have to know about her involvement that signaled far too clearly that she hadn't followed his orders. And that could only mean one thing for Ryan…. She didn't want to watch, she really, really didn't, but she owed that much to her partner. But not now and not here. As fast as her feet could carry her, she ran from the parking lot to the main entrance and opened the double doors a little bit too violently, so that it crashed open with an audible _bam_. The officer waiting behind a desk on the other side gazed at her in confusion, but didn't have the chance to ask her anything about her grand entrance – with a harsh: "Good morning", she hurried past him and towards her desk, passing the few others that had come in this early without as much as a friendly word. Kate stopped in front of the murder board and stared angrily at all the leads and dead ends they had gathered during this investigation.

„Fuck", she whispered and felt how hot tears tried to force their way into her eyes. She fought them back – no time for that now – and pulled down pictures from the board decisively in hopes that whoever was delivering information to Zimmermann would see the empty board and tell his boss. _Just please don't let it be too late_. There went Martin and Richard, Sarah and Lila, and finally Nina whose murder had started this whole affair. She wiped away the notes, every single one of them, and with every word that disappeared, her frustration grew. Was there nothing else left to do than hope that she hadn't just signed Ryan's death sentence?

Her cellphone began vibrating again and this time she knew she would have to look at it. She pulled it from her pocket and stared puzzled at the name on the display, but before she could answer it, one of the secretaries, Lara, came towards her with a cup that she placed on the desk next to her with a shy smile.

"I heard about Esposito", she muttered and took a surprised look at the empty board. "What…?", she began. Kate didn't answer – what should she have told her? Instead she decided to take the call, pressed the green button and held the phone to her ear. "Oh", she heard Lara whisper, "Sorry." The black-haired woman was about to turn around and leave, when Kate gasped a sentence that made her stop dead in her tracks: "You've got a lead on Ryan?"

Lara's eyes widened and her lips formed a single word, though she pronounced it too quietly to hear: "Kevin?". Though her crush on Kate's Irish partner never had been that much of a secret (they _were_ Detectives after all), the look of deep concern in Lara's elegant features would have been enough to tell even the most non-emphatic person in the world how she felt. "What's… what's wrong?", she muttered a little louder. Her gaze shifted from the empty murder board to Kate and back again as if she was trying to solve a puzzle.

"Yes, thank you", Kate ended her conversation. She looked at the secretary with a measuring expression, considering the for and against of her next words, then made a quick decision. "Lara, listen, this is not official and no one else can know." Lara nodded, but Kate underlined her words by adding: "No one. If any of this leaks out, it might endanger Ryan's life." _More than I already have?_ she thought grimly, but didn't say her thoughts out loud. Instead she opened the file she had received on her phone back in the car and both women watched in shock at the scene that might have stemmed straight from a horror movie. _Oh God_.

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	14. Chapter 14

**Author's note:** Hi everybody! I'm sorry it took me so long to update this time – I know it wasn't fair to leave you (or rather Kevin) hanging like that, but I can promise you this: The story is almost finished and I only need to write the final chappy, so it shouldn't happen again ;)

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"_Der Chef sagt, wir soll'n die Bude abfackeln_", Beady Eyes explained with a telling gaze at his two companions. Ryan's mind tried furiously to decipher the meaning behind those words, but he couldn't understand much more than „The boss says we...". We what? Have to send another example to Kate? Find someone else to torture? Finish the job for good? A small, but persistent voice in the back of his head almost welcomed that last thought as it would mean an end to the torment, an end to the pain that even now, after a lengthy pause from the cattle prod, overwhelmed him each time he drew in a breath or made the slightest movement. Beady Eyes had stopped filming pretty quickly, probably just enough to make a point, but that hadn't meant an end to Ryan's anguish. They hadn't said much as they continued torturing him, but the expression in their eyes had told them all he needed know: They enjoyed watching him suffer, enjoyed taking their time with him until he'd finally succumbed to the pain and had drifted off into a most welcome state of unconsciousness. He had no idea how long it had lasted, but when he finally came to, the burning sensation in his wrists, his arms, his shoulders – hell, his whole body – had just barely faded and returned the instant he instinctively tried to bring himself into a more comfortable position. He felt warm blood trickle down his arms, and when he looked down he could make out a red puddle underneath him. He felt lightheaded and his vision was still blurry, but he thought he could discern two figures standing somewhere to his right, while the last one of his captors, Beady Eyes, had to be somewhere behind him. He could hear his voice speaking quietly in German and the words "plan" and "Detective" stood out pretty clearly. A few minutes later, Beady Eyes had ended the conversation and made the announcement of… well, whatever their plan was. And whatever it was, Ryan had the feeling he wouldn't like it. Only a heartbeat later, his gloomy thought was confirmed: Tank Top mumbled something like "_besser keine Zeit verlieren_" and walked over to Ryan with decisive steps. By now there was no need for the prod anymore – a well-placed blow to his side was by far enough to set his body aflame once more, and another scream escaped his by now hoarse throat. For a second he was about to pass out again, but this time he struggled to fend off the inviting darkness, afraid that he might not awake from it if he gave in.

"L-let me… guess…", he managed to pant between strained breaths. "Kate has… has… done something naughty again." From where he got the strength to actually mock his captors after what he'd been through, he didn't know. Maybe some weird kind of gallows humor, maybe some kind of growing lethargy in the face of the inevitable. He was rewarded with another punch, this time to his face and hard enough to throw his head back and to make his nose creak in protest. Painful? No doubt. But compared to the still lasting feeling of razor sharp needles tearing into his flesh, it was almost a relief as it moved his body's focus away from the barbed wire around his wrists and his bruised ribs.

"Beckett's not an issue anymore", Beady Eyes said in a matter-of-factly voice that made Ryan's heart sink. Not an issue anymore? What was that supposed to mean? That she was…? No, no way! He pushed the mental image that was forming inside his mind aside together with the memory of Javi lying on those stairs. He had to focus on his current situation. If Kate was, indeed, "not an issue anymore", that meant that there was no further use for him, which meant that he had to focus. There would be no help. No cavalry coming to his aid in the last second. He was on his own.

"Looks like you got the idea, Detective", Beady Eyes grinned and pulled his knife from his belt very slowly as if he were enjoying the look of panic spreading on Ryan's features. He turned around to his companions and barfed some orders in German that made them leave – something about… benzene? – before directing his sole attention towards his victim. "Where were we?", he muttered in a tone as playful as it was cruel. "Ah yes, your slow and painful death."

A shudder went through Ryan at these words, but he somehow managed to keep his calm and stared right back into those cold eyes. Was this what it had been like for Herbert Mayer in his last moments? For Nina Carrera? Seeing death so clearly in the eyes of this ruthless killer?

The first slash, tearing the skin on his chest open, didn't come as a surprise, but that didn't mean it didn't hurt as hell. The pain made it impossible for Ryan not to move, which in turn meant that the already painful experience caused by the blade was intensified by a thousand times. His mouth opened to let out another scream, but another punch in his stomach turned it into an anguished cough due to a sudden lack of air and left his breathing even more strained. The taste of salty blood filled his mouth and almost made him gag.

"My baby cuts pretty deep", Beady Eyes told him. His voice sounded as if it came through a blanket or a thick fog, which told Ryan that he was already drifting off again – a luxury he couldn't afford right now. "But don't worry, it's not lethal. I'll take my time."

Ryan had every intention of retorting something like _Yeah, because that's what I'm worried about_, but this time his body was unable to follow the quite simple command of speaking. Instead, he coughed again and gave a whimper as the small movement sent fiery anguish to every corner of his body again. When the most imminent pain had subsided and his vision finally cleared, Beady Eyes had found the cellphone and was holding it up with the camera pointing towards Ryan.

"Any last words, Detective?", his adversary asked. Ryan noted that he used his other hand to clean the knife on his pants, until the blue jeans were stained with dark red blood.

This time, Ryan's voice luckily obeyed his will and he hissed with as much spite as he could muster: "Yeah. Go… go fuck yourself!"

Beady Eyes didn't even blink. „Is that how you want your friends and family to remember you?" He lifted the polished blade once more and lashed out, adding another deep cut to the growing collection on Ryan's chest. For a second, his world turned into an inferno again, robbing him of all other senses and allowing only pain to rule. He had no idea whether he had screamed, or begged, or cried, but the smug look on Beady Eyes' face as he finally was able to take in his surroundings again spoke volumes.

Was this really it? Ryan had been in life and death situations before – kinda came with the line of duty – and a few times he had been sure that he wouldn't make it out in one piece, but this was different: Here, he had actually time to think about the helplessness of his situation, and there was nothing he could do to avert the inevitable. What good did years of training do him now?

Maybe he should take Beady Eyes on his offer. He had no idea whether the video would ever end up with the right people, but then again… if they wanted to make Kate suffer, then they would have to send it to her. And that meant that he actually got a chance to say goodbye. "A-alright", he croaked and tried to lift his face enough to look directly into the camera.

"Attaboy", Beady Eyes smirked, but Ryan ignored him and tried to think of something to say. It wasn't easy – the pain was still dominating everything and made it hard to frame coherent thoughts, to say nothing of words or sentences. Then Jenny's face emerged from the darkness – her beautiful, beautiful eyes, her wonderful smile, her high, clear voice calling his name – and the next words came to him without hesitation.

"Jenny", he whispered, shocked at how weak his voice sounded to his own ears. "I… I try to tell you as much as possible… but I don't think I can ever say it enough… I love you. I love you with all my heart, and I am so, so sorry that I didn't get more time with you. I love you so much." He could feel his eyes water up and his voice break, so he hurriedly looked away. No need to make this harder on Jenny than absolutely necessary.

"Touching", his captor remarked dryly and mistreated his bare skin once more with his serrated weapon. "Anything else?"

This time it was a lot harder for Ryan to get out a coherent sentence, as it was broken by deep breaths and barely concealed sobs. Ryan had never been one to wonder about the physiology of the human body and the question of how much pain it could stand, but he knew that his threshold was about to be crossed. What would happen to him then, he did not know, and neither was he eager to find out.

"J-javi…" The word wasn't as much spoken as it was breathed. „God, I... I hope you made it." He had to gather himself for a heartbeat as memories of the sugar factory overwhelmed him. "I couldn't… I couldn't… have wished for a better partner. Or a better friend", he added. "Thanks for… for everything." Before Beady Eyes could take his silence as an invitation to continue his sick carving hobby, Ryan continued: „And Kate..." He looked directly into the camera and hoped that just some of his old fire was left for her to see. "I want you to… to do me a favor." He had no idea where he found the strength to curl his lips into a grin – marked by pain and desperation, but a grin nonetheless. "I want you to hunt these guys down and kick their asses!"

"Good enough for me", Beady Eyes commented and slammed the heavy metal handle of the knife in Ryan's face. This time he could feel how his nose gave in to the brutal treatment. Blood gushed out of it, trickling down and into his mouth. "Time to make your peace with the man upstairs."

The words barely registered. His head felt like it had been hit by a grenade, and dark spots in front of his eyes told him that he was a lot closer to another blackout than he liked. The darkness was warm and fuzzy and welcoming, and though he was afraid of dying, afraid of that final blow that would end his life, it wasn't enough to fight through the thick haze build out of never ceasing anguish and drained energy. He discerned how Beady Eyes lifted the knife in an angle that clearly showed an intention to stab rather than to inflict pain. Fuck. Even if he hadn't been tied to the hook, in his current state Ryan wasn't sure he would have been able to evade what was about to come under any circumstances. The knife was directed at his abdomen – even now Beady Eyes was going for slow and painful rather than quick and effective. He would bleed to death while hanging here, helpless, feel the life drain out of his body heartbeat by heartbeat.

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	15. Chapter 15

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Lanie couldn't have said how long she had just sat there, what she had felt, which thoughts had went through her head after the nurse had allowed her inside the ICU. At first, when she had seen Javi connected to all those tubes and lines, seen all the monitors blinking and beeping she had cursed her own medical background that told her exactly what each number on the screen meant, which functions the technical instruments performed. The endotracheal tube made it quite clear that, right now, Javi wasn't able to breathe on his own. The arterial line showed her that his blood pressure, even after the transfusion, was still dangerously low. The central venous catheter provided him with parenteral nutrition and fluids and left no doubt that, for now, he wasn't able to metabolize macronutrients. In other words: His life depended solely on those machines. She had tried to look past all of this as she sat down in a hard metal chair, and somehow she had succeeded in banishing all thoughts from her mind. Right now all bets were off, and her worries, her fears would not help anyone, on the contrary. Her fingers had instinctively taken a hold of Javi's right hand and closed firmly around it in a comforting gesture; though the touch probably gave her more comfort than him. After that she couldn't really remember anything. She vaguely recalled a nurse approaching her, but Lanie had ignored the woman and never taken her focus of the unconscious man by her side. At one point, her body had told her in its own way that it couldn't take anymore, and she had collapsed on the mattress with her head and shoulder lying next to Javi's chest.

An insisting, earsplittingly loud wailing sound shook Lanie out of her sleep. Though she didn't remember where she was or how she had ended up lying in an uncomfortable position on snow-white sheets or where the infernal noise came from, one thought stood clearly out like a sharp neon sign in her brain: _Javi_! The events of last night rushed over her like a gigantic tidal wave and suddenly everything made terrible sense. The hospital. She jumped up, not even feeling the stinging pain in her neck and back after long hours in an unnatural sleeping position, and stared panic-stricken at the instruments monitoring Javi's vital signs.

Her eyes widened, but before she could have said or done anything, a nurse came charging towards her, closely followed by one of the doctors, and she suddenly found herself swept away from the bed by the male nurse and maneuvered out of the room.

"J-javi…", she whispered, then louder: "JAVI!"

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	16. Chapter 16

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Ryan's adversary moved the blade forward as if in slow motion and a horrifying scene from Saving Private Ryan suddenly popped into Ryan's mind when the tip touched and pierced his skin and was pushed deeper inch by inch. The irony, however, was quickly drowned out as an all-encompassing panic seized him, centered around one single thought: _I'm going to die._

Suddenly, the blade was pulled out with an irritated snarl.

"WHAT?!", Ryan heard Beady Eyes growl, and he forced himself to lift his head. It felt far too heavy and hurt like hell, but somehow he managed to look into the direction of the disturbance. The door had been opened and Tank Top stood there with someone at his side. Someone Ryan barely recognized in his half-conscious state of mind. A woman with long, black hair and a terrified expression on her usually pretty features. For a second, he thought she was about to say something to him, but then she seemed to make up her mind and directed her attention towards Beady Eyes instead.

"You might still need him", she explained in an almost toneless voice. "Beckett's got a new clue."

Both Tank Top and Beady Eyes just snorted at those words and the one with the knife shot back: "Zimmermann gave the order." Then he added in a more hushed voice: "You shouldn't have come here, Lara."

Lara gave a sound somewhere between a snort of derision and a gulp of fear – Ryan wasn't sure and frankly, right now, he didn't care. Lara. A missing piece of their puzzle. That explained how Zimmermann had known about them and the sugar factory. At first, he refused to believe it – Lara, a traitor? He remembered the mornings she had served him coffee with that brilliant smile of hers. How she had given him encouraging words when he'd hit a dead end. And yet here she was, standing next to two German hit men as calmly as on a stroll through the park, speaking about him as if he was nothing more than leverage. Which, in a manner of speaking, he was. The facts were overwhelming and pointed in only one direction: She had been their inside man, gathering information about the case and giving away Christopher's whereabouts, thereby endangering the whole team. He wanted to say something to her, anything really, but instead he just stared at the scene unfolding in front of him in shock.

"As none of you fine gents chose to answer your phones", she gave back with a flutter of her eyelashes, "I decided to take matters into my own hands. And not a second too soon, I see", she added with a glance at Ryan's battered figure.

"We're giving up on the op", Tank Top grunted. "So whatever Beckett thinks she has on this, in fifteen minutes it's not going to be worth anything." He said something in German to Beady Eyes and left with a last dissatisfied glance at Lara, closing the door behind him with a loud bang.

"You don't want to see this", the other man snarled at her and returned to Ryan with the knife held threateningly in front of him to finish what he had started.

Last chance to maybe get at least some peace of mind, Ryan thought and said in as steady a voice as he could muster: "L-lara…" His tongue felt unnaturally heavy and made the word sound sluggish. "Is… is Javi…?" He looked past Beady Eyes and tried to read the expression in her eyes, but it was no use. She had approached him and was standing only a few steps behind his torturer, the same blank look on her face. At the mention of Javi's name, she blinked in surprise, but quickly regained her posture and muttered: "Don't worry. You'll be with your beloved _bro_ soon."

At that, Beady Eyes made a chuckling sound as if Lara had told a priceless joke. "I must say, I _do_ like you, Lara". Then he focused on Ryan again, quite obviously enjoying the glance of pure shock and despair in the Detective's eyes.

So Javi was dead? No, that couldn't be. Javi was as tough as nails. It just couldn't be. After everything he had been through, Ryan wouldn't have thought it possible, but that one sentence somehow hurt much more than all of the torture he'd been subjected to. It felt as if an iron fist punched him in the chest, pressing the air out of his lungs, gripping his heart and trying to pull it out of his body. At that point he didn't even care anymore that the knife was guided towards his stomach once more. Javi was dead. There was a traitor working for Zimmermann at the 12th that would prevent the German mob boss from paying for his crimes. And there was no way he'd be getting out of here. Anger mixed up with his pain, his despair, and he suddenly found the strength to stare directly into his adversary's eyes and to roar in an impossibly steady voice: "YOU BASTARD! I HOPE YOU ROT IN HELL!"

And so he did. Within the few seconds it had taken Beady Eyes to continue his murderous deed, Lara had reached for the bolt cutter still lying on the ground and resolutely used it as a club, letting it come crashing down on the man's head with a stomach-churning _crunch_. His eyes rolled into the back of his head and he somehow managed to keep himself upright for a few more seconds before his knees gave in and he plummeted to the ground like a bag of potatoes. At the same time, Lara's mask burst and she shrieked in a high-pitched tone of voice: "OH GOD! KEVIN!"

It had all happened so fast that Ryan didn't have the time to respond to her sudden outburst. He watched in confusion as she grasped the chair next to him, placed herself on top if it and used the bloody bolt cutter to sever the barbed wire. He had just enough time to brace himself before the pain blazed up anew as the razor sharp wire released its grasp on his wrists and gravity kicked in. It felt as if chunks of skin were simply ripped out of his arm, and he would have lost his balance and fallen if it hadn't been for Lara's supporting hands. She dropped her weapon and tried to steady him, but no matter where her fingers touched his skin, they provoked a new inferno and he yelped in pain.

"Oh God, I am so, so, so sorry! I didn't… I didn't think… I didn't know…" She said more, but it turned into a blur with the sound of his own heartbeat, the sound of blood rushing through his veins now that the circulation through his arms returned to normal. He could feel blood being pumped out through the deep gashes in his wrists and his chest, and black spots danced once more in front of his eyes, growing larger by the second. How much blood had he already lost? He had to bandage the wounds, had to…

Lara was way ahead of him. She had already ripped her blouse off and now used it to put pressure on his wrists, and though he knew it was necessary, he couldn't help but whimper at the touch. "I'm… I'm sorry", she gasped in surprise, "I have to stop the bleeding."

Ryan didn't answer. Now that the worst pain had subsided again and there was no imminent threat to his life, a single thought entered his mind and he whispered: "J-javi?" in hopes that maybe, just maybe, she had lied about his death to make her disguise more believable.

"Oh God", she moaned as if she only just remembered: "He's…"

She never got to finish her sentence. The door was pushed open and Tank Top's voice called out: "_Alles klar für unsern Abg-_" The last word must have been stuck in his throat, because he fell silent abruptly as if taking in the scene in front of him required too much of his mental energy to go on. Unfortunately, there was nothing wrong with his reflexes, because he pulled out a gun and fired a shot in their general direction before either of them could as much as blink. Ryan stood like frozen, still trying to push away the dark veil in front of his eyes, but Lara's reaction came a lot more swiftly. Without hesitation, she pushed him out of harm's way only to be thrown back by the sheer force of impact as she was hit.

And finally Ryan's own reflexes and training, enhanced by adrenaline, kicked in. His bloody hands got a hold of the chair and he hurled it towards their attacker with as much strength as he could muster. The movement was slow and made every fiber in his body scream in protest, and it wasn't nearly enough to take his adversary out of the equation permanently, but it did change the cards: Tank Top apparently hadn't anticipated any resistance, so even though he managed to jump to the side to avoid being hit by flying furniture, it did cost him valuable seconds that Ryan exploited by charging forward with all his body weight. He managed to get a hold of Tank Top's right arm and whanged it forcefully against the doorframe, knocking the gun right out of his enemy's hand and pushing both of them away from it and out into the hall. Tank Top grunted in pain as their struggle ended quite painfully when he slammed back first into a wall. Though Tank Top served as padding, the impact was still hard enough to beckon the veil of unconsciousness inside yet again and Ryan had to force himself to make it back to the surface. Dammit! He might have surprised Tank Top, but that didn't change the fact that his body was as close to broken as it had ever been and thereby left him with a major disadvantage. But what else could he have done? Standing still and letting himself get shot? Especially after Lara had taken a bullet for him? The fraction of a second it took him to wonder whether the secretary was going to be alright was enough for Tank Top to counter Ryan's attack by ramming his knee up into the Detective's chest, setting the bruised ribs ablaze and leaving him breathless. The man followed up on his attack with a blow on the back of Ryan's head, but he managed to throw himself to the side, just barely avoiding the clenched fist. Shoulder first, he crashed onto the ground, letting out a pained gasp as his mistreated wrists came into close contact with the rugged concrete. Tank Top tried to scramble past him, probably to get his gun, but Ryan reacted swiftly, wrapping his feet around the taller man's leg and making him trip.

And that was where his luck ended. The German proved to be quite dexterous, going with the fall and using it to roll off his shoulder and landing almost impossibly elegantly next to his weapon. He picked it up in one smooth motion as he got back to his feet and pointed it at Ryan who had just barely managed to get up on one knee. For a heartbeat, Ryan stared in disbelief into the muzzle of the Glock, then his gaze met Tank Top's and he knew without a doubt that his adversary would pull the trigger. Time seemed to stand still, all other sounds drowned out by his own frantic heartbeat and his heavy breathing.

"That's for Markus", Tank Top said without any emotion. The next thing Ryan heard was the dreaded sound of a Glock being fired and he instinctively shut his eyes, anticipating the burning sensation of a .355 inch bullet piercing through his forehead and turning his world into eternal darkness.

Nothing happened. He waited a few seconds longer, then dared to blink his eyes open. Was Tank Top just playing with him? If he was, it was a pretty weird game, because the German hit man was lying in front of him in a quickly growing puddle of blood that stemmed from a circular wound in his chest. His eyes stared up, broken and empty with no spark of life left in them.

"Huh, what do you know! I think I'm getting better at this!", Ryan heard a familiar voice, and as he turned around, he saw his by now certainly most favorite writer look down on him with a stunned expression. In his hands, he was still holding a service weapon that pointed at nothing in particular. "Hit him right in the heart!", Castle mumbled and gazed from the gun to the dead man and back to the gun as if trying to understand that he'd actually hit something. Then his expression changed and a shadow seemed to fall on his rugged features. "You've looked better", he commented and reached out his right hand to help Ryan up. The Detective accepted the offer thankfully, but didn't stay to chat – the second he was convinced that his legs were steady enough to hold his body weight, he darted back into the room and was at Lara's side within a heartbeat. Behind him, he heard Castle swear and out of the corner of his eye he noticed the writer scramble towards them as if he had only now understood that Ryan hadn't been the only one in mortal danger. Castle pulled out his cellphone, probably to call an ambulance, but Ryan knew it was too late. The bullet hadn't hit her heart, but it was close enough to tell Ryan everything he needed to know. As did Lara; he could tell by the fearful, yet resigned expression in her eyes. When he tried to put pressure on the wound, his blood mixing with hers, she weakly shook her head and tried to say something, but the words were drowned in red liquid. She coughed and more blood covered her chin, her throat. "D-don't", Ryan whispered. It had all happened so fast – the revelation that Lara had betrayed them, then her sudden change of heart, her sacrifice… He didn't know what to think or to feel, but she didn't seem to expect anything from him. Her bloody hand reached for his and he squeezed it tightly to give her as much comfort as possible.

"S-sorry", she coughed. "J-javi's… still alive…"

Ryan could almost literally feel the load being taken off his mind at those words. _Oh, thank God_, he thought, but before he could answer her, a violent shudder went through her body and she spat out more blood, so much blood. Her next words were almost inaudible, so he crept closer, not letting go off her hand.

"J-jenny's… a lucky… woman", Lara brought forth. Her lips curled into something that was probably meant to be a smile, but the blood and the pain turned it into a grimace that cut deep into Ryan's heart. Her head sank down and she closed her eyes, inhaling and exhaling deeply once, twice. Then Ryan could feel how every ounce of strength left her body as her heart gave in.

"Is she…", he heard Castle mutter behind him in a toneless voice. Ryan nodded and let go of Lara's hand, placing it gently on the concrete floor. He knew he had every right in the world to be cynical about her death, stating that she had just gotten what she deserved after betraying them, but all he felt as he looked at her peaceful expression was a deep sadness. Another life claimed by this insane case.

He took a deep breath and made an attempt to get to his feet, but with the adrenaline boost gone his body wasn't as forthcoming at following orders as it had been during his fight with Tank Top. Dark shadows danced in front of his eyes once more and the whole room started spinning like a carousel out of control; if it hadn't been for Castle's quick reaction, he would have fallen back down on his knees.

"T-thanks", he stammered. "We better –" His words were interrupted by a deafening _boom_, followed by a violent quake underneath his feet that sent him and Castle back on the ground.

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	17. Chapter 17

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Kate hadn't been all too happy to hand out a gun to Castle, but he had had a point when he'd looked at her with a serious expression: "Too much space to cover. We have to split up."

The warehouse was indeed extensive and she had finally given in to his demand; after all it had been his brilliant idea that had provided them with a solid lead concerning Ryan's whereabouts. She still had to struggle to banish the image of her partner being tortured from her mind and had to cling to the one thought that could comfort her just a little bit: The video she had received from a burner phone had only showed the torture – terrible enough as it was – but at the end of it, Ryan had still been alive. And apparently that was exactly what Lara had been thinking, when she had stood next to Kate to witness Ryan's anguish. It hadn't been a coincidence that Kate had aroused the secretary's interest by mentioning Kevin's name. The man on the phone had been Castle and he'd had some interesting news. Considering how Nina Carrera had been pulled into all of this, he had pondered whether the inside man at the 12th working for Zimmermann might owe some money to the German as well, so he'd pulled some strings with a friend at the IRS and soon stood with a short list of names. As far as he could tell, only one of them had been close to them during the Carrera investigation, and that had been Lara. He had called Beckett the instance he'd found out and from there, a plan had formed in her head quickly enough to exploit Lara's feelings for the Irish Detective. Lying to her had been easy – once she'd heard Ryan's name and seen the video, she'd made up an excuse about having forgotten something at home. Kate had followed her all the way to the Port of Jersey and contacted Castle on the way – not the most effective backup of all time, but she was afraid of what would happen to Ryan if they were wrong and Lara wasn't the snitch.

Lara had stopped her car in front of a large warehouse complex close to the anchorage of the Eastern Gold Starline. No surprises there – though if Kate would have been behind the whole operation, she would have chosen a less obvious location. Then again, if no one suspected anything, then why not go with the "hiding in plain sight" concept? Kate had stopped her Crown Vic a quarter mile away from the building and met up with Castle, spending the time it took him to arrive to keep a wary eye on the entrances of the warehouse. There were two; a small door and a larger portal that probably was used for trucks to bring and deliver containers. As far as she could see, there were no guards. Weird. But Lara _had_ knocked before entering and someone had opened the small door, so somebody was waiting behind that entrance. How many were there? A large operation like this would require the help of several others, but as far as she knew Zimmermann he liked to keep things simple with as few witnesses as possible. So what… five, maybe six henchmen? It was a rough estimate and Kate had no way to verify her assumption. And most importantly: She had no time to gather more information. She had no idea what Lara would tell Zimmermann's men – had she read the woman correctly, when she assumed that she had driven out here in concern of Ryan? Or was she on her way to tell her partner's captors that Kate was on her way, following another lead and thereby _not_ following orders? Either way, she would have to hurry. Even if those thugs hadn't intended to kill Ryan just yet, the video had shown her quite thoroughly in how miserable a shape he was. There was no time to lose.

She had told Castle about her musings and the writer had presented the idea of splitting up once they had gotten inside. Under normal circumstances, Kate would have argued quite a lot about this reckless approach, but circumstances weren't normal. Somehow they never were. So they had snuck up from one of the sides of the building, noticing the absolute lack of cameras on the outside. Though it had seemed weird at first, it actually made good sense – Zimmermann wouldn't want to catch his illegal operation on tape. When they had reached the door with a keypad lock, Kate had hesitated briefly, but decided that time was too much against them to find another way in: Using her jacket as a silencer, she had shot the keypad and sent a quiet thank you to her guardian angel, when the door had swung open without as much as a squeak.

The first thing she had noticed was the penetrant odor of gasoline that filled the air as if somebody had forgotten to shut off the pump after filling up the car. The smell bit her nose and almost made her gag. Castle used his sleeve to breathe through, moving slowly forward next to her. At first Kate couldn't hear anything, but as soon as her hearing had gotten used to the quiet warehouse, she thought she heard faint voices. They sounded agitated, though it was hard to tell. They had reached a large storage area with lots of containers that obstructed their view of the giant warehouse, and what was worse: They could continue left or right.

"I'm calling right!", Castle whispered. They still hadn't met or even seen anyone, but the smell of gasoline grew stronger as if they were closer to the source by now.

Kate shot him a look that she hoped would tell him what she thought about his plan, but considering she hadn't a better idea, she whispered: "Be careful. Do _not_ encounter them! If you can see you're on the right track, you come get me!"

"What if they encounter me first?", he smirked – an expression that she found both charming and unnerving. Incredible how he could drive her mad and enchant her at the same time. Right now, though, the unnerving part won and she hissed: "Just don't get caught!" With that she had turned to her left and followed the hallway around the containers.

The design of the warehouse made it easy for her to move as silently as a cat. The large hall was filled to the brim and seemed to absorb the sound her footsteps made on the concrete floor, but still she made an effort to tread as lightly as possible, her Glock held closely by her side. Every other minute or so, she was haunted by a single thought –_ This is crazy_ – that she shoved back into the deepest corner of her head through pure sheer force of will. Yes, it was crazy. But what choice did they have? So she moved forward, following the rows of containers until she came to another T-section.

That was when she heard the gurgling sound of water being spilled from a bottle somewhere to her right. Water…? If the smell was any indication, gasoline was a lot more likely… She crept closer towards the bend with controlled movements in order not to give herself away. The gurgling came to an end and was followed by the sound of metal clanging on concrete. A canister thrown away? Next she heard footsteps walking further away from her, which meant she hadn't been discovered yet. At least something that was going right.

Kate risked a peek around the corner and just managed to catch a glimpse of a tall, broad shouldered man disappearing behind more containers on his right. On the wall to the left she discerned two doors, both of them closed. Maybe one of them would lead her to Ryan… and more of Zimmermann's men? The floor in front of her was covered in gasoline and she noticed two large canisters lying empty next to the door furthest away. Were they going to torch the place? Considering what had happened to the sugar refinery and the Wellerby mansion, that kind of M.O. would fit right in.

As soon as the shadow of the large man had disappeared behind the container, Kate moved onward and past the doors. As much as she wanted to check whether her partner was being held behind one of them, she would have to take out the man first before he could gain the element of surprise on her. Then she had reached the next hallway and made out her target at the far end: The man – damn, the guy was a giant! – had found more inflammable material and was using it to douse this part of the warehouse as well.

Now what? As far as she could see, this was a dead end without any other henchmen, and she clearly had the advantage of having her gun at the ready, while the Giant had his placed in his belt. But even though the acoustics of this place were in her favor, the shot would still resonate far too loudly and might attract unwanted attention. So wait until he made his way back and then encounter him at close range? The guy did look quite strong, and though his grey hair told her that he was already somewhere in his fifties she was pretty sure that there was nothing wrong with his reflexes. Maybe…

A loud banging sound emerged from somewhere behind her and a shrill voice yelled something in Russian that Kate didn't catch. But it did not sound happy and it _did_ direct the Giant's focus towards the hallway he'd just left. Fuck. Kate tried to duck behind the container she had passed, but for the fraction of a second their gazes locked and she knew without a flicker of doubt that he had seen her. The voice cried out again, this time in heavily accented English: "LET US OUT!"

Other girls like Mishka? It made sense, but Kate didn't have the time to think about them right now. She could hear the Giant drop his canister and sprint forward with a German curse on his lips, then a gunshot echoed through the warehouse, followed by several screams from the hallway behind her. The aim was far off and had probably been meant as a warning shot, but Kate still threw herself to the side instinctively and let out a curse herself when she landed in a puddle of gasoline that instantly soaked her blazer and trousers. She quickly got to her knees and pointed her weapon at the corner, breathing heavily and waiting for the guy to pursue her.

But he didn't. Of course he didn't. He would know that she had a gun herself and was too well trained to run into the line of fire. Instead she heard his deep voice – the same that had spoken to her at the sugar refinery – say: "So, this is you staying out of this case, Detective Beckett. If I may say so, you are doing a lousy job."

Kate used the few seconds it took the man to address her to move closer towards the corner again as silently as possible in order not to give away her precise position. Maybe if she got close enough…

"I mean, getting Martin and Richard killed like that… and now that poor Detective Ryan… you are leaving quite the bloody path behind you, are you not?", the Giant continued. He was trying to provoke her, that much was obvious, but why? Had he somehow already alarmed his buddies and was just trying to win some time? Or was he just toying with her? And more importantly: Was he telling the truth about Kevin?

_Focus!_, she chided herself. She would find out soon enough, _if_ she survived this. So she crept ever closer to the corner, her gun at the ready, until she was only inches away from the edge of the last container. She couldn't hear the Giant on the other side, so she had no idea how close or far away he was. When he had spoken, he had sounded close by, but that had been several seconds ago that he might have used to bring some distance between them. She had only one shot, and she knew he was probably waiting for her head to pop out and present a target.

Kate took a deep breath and closed her eyes for a heartbeat to gather her concentration. Now. She used her leg muscles to catapult herself to the side and aimed her gun at … nothing. The guy was gone.

"What the...", she muttered as she got to her feet and stared down the empty hallway. Where could he… The answer came far too quickly and from an unexpected side, and all the warning she got was a quick flicker of a shadow somewhere above her. Her reflexes saved her from the direct impact as the Giant threw himself at her from the top of the stacked crates next to her, but he still succeeded in slamming his fist into her back and sending her flying head first into the wall.

Kate was thankful for two things when her forehead made far too intimate contact with the concrete: One: Years and years of painful encounters that must have hardened her enough to not simply black out, and two: Her merciless combat trainer who had made her perform endless combinations of forceful circle kicks. At the time she had been afraid that, at some point, it would simply dislodge her hip from its joints. Now she watched in satisfaction as the Giant tumbled backwards and connected equally brutally with the hard metal of a container after being hit directly in the solar plexus. Unfortunately he proved to be just as tough and she barely managed to scramble out of the way as he lurched forward again. He must have anticipated her evasive maneuver, because as she took a quick step to the side and tried to bring her service weapon into a defensive position, his hand lashed out and came crashing down upon her wrist hard enough to knock the gun out of her hand. Kate yelped in pain and ducked instinctively when the man followed up on his attack with a dexterous circle kick that in no way was inferior to hers. Damn, the guy was good. But even though he was fast – incredibly fast for someone his size – his bulky frame was still a disadvantage in a fight with an equally trained, but more slender adversary like Kate. While in squatting position, she used one hand as a support, let herself swirl around and planted a hard kick on the man's shin that should have been enough to make him lose his balance. Should have. He grunted in pain and the expression in his eyes was nothing less but murderous, but her counterattack didn't stop him from charging forward with the force of a freight train while she was still getting back up. Despite the seemingly rage-induced attack she could tell that his movements were controlled and perfectly balanced to match both his strength and dexterity; he'd probably received some kind of military or some similar training. Knowing this, she didn't fall for his ruse that invited her to sidestep his charge and attack him from behind. Instead she feigned a step to the left, then, as the Giant followed that movement with a grin on his lips, darted forward and placed her elbow as hard as her muscles would allow on his unprotected neck. All she achieved was a sharp pain that shot through her arm. She might as well have hit a wall; the guy was as unyielding as the concrete around her.

The surprise at his total lack of a reaction cost Kate a valuable second that didn't go unexploited. Her adversary turned around and lurched out for her with one of his gigantic paws, hitting her directly in the temple and sending her back on one knee. She felt dizzy and her head suddenly seemed to be filled with a million angry bees buzzing in unison and making it impossible to think clearly. When she noticed the black shadow out of the corner of her eye closing in once more, she reacted purely out of instinct as she threw herself directly into the Giant's next charge. What a kick to the leg hadn't achieved, her full bodyweight did surprisingly well, though it came with a heavy price: It was like she had collided with a small truck that was hell-bent on breaking every bone in her body. Her back creaked in protest and left her stunned for one terrible second, her head filled with panicky thoughts of broken vertebrae, but when she tried to move her legs, they grudgingly obeyed her command. Thank God. And her unanticipated move somehow had done the trick: The Giant was caught completely off guard and landed with a loud thud and a pained groan on his side. Though those weren't the only sounds Kate heard at the impact. She thought there had been something else, some kind of silent _click_ like… like a gun being cocked? Oh fuck. Despite the pain in her back, Kate jumped to her feet and swiveled around, knowing only too well that it might already be too late.

She blinked in confusion at the empty hallway in front of her. There was no one there. Then what…? Before she could even blink in surprise, she felt a sharp pain in her legs, then her world got turned upside down as the Giant brought her crashing down by crossing his legs around hers. Apparently even a crash like that hadn't been enough to take him out, and she had been too occupied with the new threat to think about her primary enemy. Stupid, stupid, stupid! Kate somehow managed to break most of the fall by turning in midair and landing on her right shoulder, but the impact still knocked the wind from her lungs and this time she had to struggle a second too long to regain her senses.

When she flipped herself around to face her adversary, he was, to Kate's surprise, on the run. And the source of the mysterious _click_ revealed itself in all its deadliness: A detonator. The Giant must have had it on him when Kate took him down. Whether it had been activated accidentally by the impact or deliberately, Kate couldn't say and frankly, right now it didn't matter. There was no timer on it, but the blinking red light and the German hit man's fast escape told her everything she needed to know. She struggled to her feet and spent two precious second – one to pick up her Glock, one on taking a closer look at the device for a button to deactivate it, but of course there wasn't one. The Giant wouldn't be running for his life if there had been.

So Kate ran. She made it about two steps away, when whatever the detonator was connected to went off and a thunderous _boom_ sent her flying forward like a gigantic, invisible fist punching her in the back. She stumbled and somehow managed to keep her balance, but the sound of the blast still rang in her ears and made her dizzy. A wave of heat rushed over her and a penetrant smell of something burning stung in her nose. She ignored her body's imploring signals to slow down and tried to come into a sprint again, only to be stopped by at least a dozen voices shrieking in panic. The girls! Oh God, how could she have forgotten?! With two more steps, Kate had reached the first door and knew by the sound of fists banging against the metal from the other side that she had found the right one. It was locked. Of course.

"STAND BACK!", she shouted and hoped they would understand her command. Behind her, she could discern orange flames licking at the fuel spread everywhere, and she had to fight hard against her instincts that told her to run. _Not yet_, she told herself and attacked the lock with a violent circle kick. The girls screamed in unison, but at least one of them had the good sense to put together two and two. The door was pushed open violently and a tall girl with a brown ponytail came rushing through, her eyes wide in fear. She wasn't much older than Mishka. None of them were, Kate noticed as the next two followed the first girl and stared at her in a mixture of fear and hope.

"GO!", Kate shouted and made an unmistakable gesture towards the way she had come, waiting impatiently while the last girls – thirteen in all – hurried out of their prison. It couldn't have taken much more than half a minute, but it was enough time for the fire to almost reach her.

She had just made sure that they hadn't left anyone behind and was on her way out of the room when the next explosion hit, closer than the one before. It was pure luck that allowed Kate to throw herself sideways as she discerned the blinking red light in one corner of the girl's cell telling her that this was _not_ the place to be right now. The ground shook underneath her and an enormous orange tongue shot through the open door with a deafening roar, licking greedily at her back.

Every bone in her body seemed to ache and she felt completely disoriented as she tried to scramble back to her feet. She didn't hear the slightest sound, as if somebody had put wax into her ears, which made the flames around her seem strangely surreal, and it took her a second too long to remember that she had landed in a puddle of gasoline during her fight with the Giant. A searing pain on her back reminded her all too well of the danger she was in, and she tried to pull off her burning jacket with clumsy movements. Too slow. She was reacting far too slowly. Already the fire had spread all around her, bringing with it heavy, black smoke that made it hard to breathe. Her eyes began to water, obstructing her view. Out. She had to get out. But where had she come from? The world seemed to be spinning around her as it turned into a fiery ocean of glowing orange and red, and she had to shield her face with her hands due to the violent heat, letting her by now uncomfortably hot service weapon fall to the ground.

_Just run!_, she heard herself think and had to agree. If she stayed here, she was dead no matter what. So she ducked under the smoke and ran into the direction she had faced after the second explosion had hit. Twice in one day. How could she be caught in a burning building twice in one day?! What was worse – this time there was no pool that would save her. Breathing got harder and Kate let out a pained cough, but she did not stop. Half running, half stumbling she reached an intersection and prayed to God she chose correctly as she turned left and continued down a hallway. The fire was feeding on the wooden crates, and she could see flames licking out of some of the containers, the metal a bright red. She tried to accelerate her pace, but tripped and lost a precious second when she tried to get back on her feet. It was a lot easier than she had expected in her current state, and it took her another heartbeat to realize that somebody had helped her up. As she looked up, she saw the frame of a male face, familiar, though blurry. The lips were moving, but she still couldn't hear anything but a faint echo. She just grabbed a hold of the arm helping her up and allowed her rescuer to half-carry her through the flaming nightmare. A third explosion shook the concrete beneath their feet and they both had to struggle for balance. Kate felt something hit her right shoulder and held back a cry of pain that would have caused her to inhale far too much of the poisonous smoke around her. _Focus on running. Focus. __Focus!_

She focused on her feet, putting one in front of the other repeatedly, ignoring the burning heat that seared her skin as best as she could. Kate felt a shudder go through the man beside her, probably a cough, and she tried to support him as much as he supported her to prevent him from stumbling. Left, right. Left, right. Left, right. The corridor seemed to go on forever, with the containers and crates towering above them like giant, unstable playing blocks just waiting to collapse. Another violent shake. Was this whole place rigged to blow? Or was there something explosive in the containers? Kate tried once more to hurry up and finally saw something to lighten her spirits: They had left the storeroom and reached the hallway that led out of the building! And not a second too soon. The next explosion literally knocked the breath from their lungs and made them tumble hard on the concrete floor. Kate used the momentum from the fall to catapult herself back to her feet and noticed out of the corner of her eye how her rescuer did the same, though not quite as elegantly. She stretched out her hand to assist him and pulled him with her as she darted towards the exit as fast as her battered body would allow her. Then they were outside in the crisp morning air and Kate instinctively drew in several deep breaths to fight the effects of the smoke. Behind her, dark clouds billowed out of the door and the cracks around the large gate, encompassing most of the entrance side of the warehouse. In front of her, she saw the silhouettes of several people. The girls?

They were too close. She remembered vividly what had happened to the Wellerby mansion and she had no doubt that the final plan for the warehouse looked a lot like _that_ memory. Though she still couldn't hear a thing, she hoped that her voice would be loud and clear as she yelled: "INTO THE WATER!" and pulled her companion towards the harbor. If she had had the tiniest choice, she would never, ever go for a swim in the Upper Bay voluntarily. But as the situation presented itself right now, she didn't even hesitate for the fraction of a second before she jumped off the pier and into the murky water below. As she broke through the surface and the darkness below suddenly was alit by a bright orange shimmer, she couldn't help but think that this really, really hadn't been her day.

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	18. Epilogue

Epilogue

The first thing Ryan discerned was a bright light blinding him. He blinked in confusion and tried to gather his thoughts, but right now nothing seemed to make any sense. He remembered vaguely how he and Castle had found their way out of the warehouse, but most of their escape was a blur. The blood loss and everything his body and mind had had to endure for the last hours had decided to take their toll, and not even the rush of adrenaline at the sudden explosion had been enough to wake him up from his haze. He remembered golden morning light and a cold breeze and other people, teenage girls – _teenage girls?! What the…?!_ – and Castle's frantic voice as he couldn't find Kate. The warehouse was burning brightly like the world's largest bonfire, and Kate was still inside. Oh God. Ignoring his body's signals to simply lie down on the pier, he'd tried to hurry back towards the entrance, but a hand had grasped his shoulder and held him back, and he didn't have the strength to fight against the grip anymore. Next… God, everything was so unclear… Had he passed out? Some pieces must have been missing, because the next thing he knew was cold water everywhere and then… nothing.

He tried to sit up, tried to open his eyes, but it was incredibly difficult, neigh impossible, as if his body was fighting his attempts vigorously. Beneath him, he could feel something soft – a mattress? Maybe. Or maybe he had died and gone to heaven and that thing underneath him was a cloud. In his current state either explanation seemed plausible.

"Easy there, bro", he heard a voice say from somewhere close to him. Though it sounded like it had to make its way through a thick fog, he knew instantly who it belonged to.

"Am I… am I dead?", he brought forth with difficulty. His tongue was as willing to cooperate as the rest of his body, and the few words sounded sluggish even to his own ears. They were probably impossible to understand for anyone else than the person next to him.

The sound that answered him was something between a chuckle and a pained groan. "Don't think so. That would mean _I_'d be dead, and that would mean this wouldn't hurt as much."

Ryan couldn't help but laugh. It wasn't much more than a weak gurgling sound, but at least it didn't hurt as much as he had feared it would. Contrary to his partner, he was probably still on some heavy pain killers, which would explain why it was so hard to force his body to do anything.

"You… you have no idea how glad I am to hear your voice", he added after a second during which he just let the knowledge that Javier Esposito was still alive encompass him with a relieving, warm and somehow fuzzy feeling. Even though Lara had told him, he hadn't allowed himself to actually believe it, afraid of how much harder news of his friend's death would hit him if he expected him to be alive and kicking. Well… alive, at the least.

For a heartbeat, he thought he could almost hear Javi smile, then his partner replied in a more hushed tone of voice: "I think I might've."

Ryan didn't reply at once. He tried to think back to those fateful minutes inside the Domino Sugar factory, remembering every little detail far too vividly, just as he had done countless times during his captivity. But at least now he knew how Javi's close encounter with death had ended, which made the scene inside the stairwell almost bearable. Almost.

Javi seemed to take his silence as a sign to continue, because after a few seconds he went on: "They didn't know anything about your whereabouts when I first woke up. All Lanie could tell me was that you were chasing the junkie who'd shot me." He laughed, but it sounded everything but amused. "The _junkie_. Kate had lied to one of her best friends when she told Lanie about what happened at the factory. That's when I knew that you really had to be in trouble. Roy explained everything to me when he got to the hospital, which – honestly, bro? – didn't make things any better. Do you have any idea how worried I was?"

Of course Ryan had an idea. Thankfully, most of what he had been through was still quite fuzzy, but two things stood out clearly: Pain – a lot of physical pain – and a worry for Javi's life so deep it had managed to overshadow almost everything else. Once more he tried to get up, using his elbows as a support. It was still almost impossibly hard, and despite the pain killers his body screamed in protest, making him groan. Finally he managed to get a look at Javi, who was sitting upright in the bed next to his. His chest had been tightly bandaged and he was hooked up to a machine measuring his vital signs, but otherwise he actually looked a whole lot better than Ryan would have expected after his ordeal. He wondered briefly how long he had been out, but decided that now wasn't the time to dwell on something as insignificant as time. Javi's mocha brown eyes bored into his, filled with a deep worry, and he felt himself smile at the sight of his partner. Even that tiny movement of his facial muscles hurt, but it was so worth it when Javi's expression lightened up and he returned the smile.

"So", Ryan muttered. "I guess we both knew what to tell death when we got close to him, didn't we?"

Javi's reluctant smile turned into a full-blown, mischievous grin at the reference. "Not today", he replied. Then he added, almost as an afterthought: "But let's not make a habit out of close encounters with him. Deal?"

"Deal", Ryan answered and allowed himself to sink back into the heavenly soft mattress. There was so much he wanted to ask, so much that still didn't make any sense, so much that he would have to process somehow, but for now the knowledge that his best friend was alive and would be there when he woke up would have to do. Holding that thought, he drifted off into a deep, dreamless sleep.

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Kate had been on her way into the hospital room when Ryan had woken up, but decided to let her two partners have a moment to themselves. She had _not_ expected them to fall asleep again after less than five minutes. Now she didn't really know what to do with herself and the two boxes of chocolate she had bought for them. Maybe she should just eat them. Even though it had been two days since that morning at the harbor, she still hadn't managed to build up an appetite, so she had basically lived off coffee, a few biscuits and a sandwich which Castle had handed her yesterday with a worried expression.

"Eat", had been all he had said. But how could she? She had somehow almost managed to get two of her best friends killed, hadn't been able to stop the man behind this whole bizarre murder case – and now she was stuck with a huge amount of paperwork and the ungrateful task of handing Mishka and her fellow sufferers over to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, without a doubt to be deported. So unfair. Without Mishka she would never have found the warehouse where Ryan had been held captive. Without Mishka, Ryan would now be dead and all of Zimmermann's thugs would still be at large. But she was an illegal alien and would have to be sent back to her home country. For Kate it felt as if stabbing the girl in the back.

"Awww, look at the boys taking a nap", she suddenly heard a familiar voice whisper behind her.

Kate had been so lost in thought, she almost dropped the chocolates. "Don't sneak up on me like that, Castle!" she hissed quietly and swirled around to face him. She wasn't angry with him, just deeply, deeply frustrated with the whole situation, and she regretted her aggressive tone of voice the second the words had left her mouth. Fortunately, Castle didn't seem to mind. His smile was warm as always, and it broadened when he discovered the two golden boxes in her hands. With a "Yummy" he grasped one of them, ripped off the packaging and offered her a white truffle with a strawberry cream filling by waving it in front of her mouth. "Time for breakfast", he commented and took another one for himself.

Infuriating. And charming. At the same time. She would never learn to understand how he did what he did to her, but for now she just accepted his gesture – a truffle with a strawberry cream filling was still better than no breakfast at all – and enjoyed the sweetness on her tongue.

It was instantly replaced by bitterness when Castle said with a more serious expression: "So. I saw your letter to the USICE."

For a second, Kate was tempted to snarl something as eloquent as "Fuck them!" or "Freaking legislation!", but she managed to stop herself by gently biting down on her tongue. Vulgarity surely wouldn't change the unfortunate situation the Eastern European girls found themselves in. Instead she muttered: "What of it?"

Castle smirked, confusing her once again. "I was just wondering… Who are those girls you're writing about in the letter?"

For a heartbeat she simply stared at him, pondering about the possibility of insanity finally getting the better of her companion. Then she remembered _who_ he was and asked in an impatient, yet curious tone of voice: "What are you saying?"

"Oh, it's just that I don't really recall any girls being involved in this whole story. Especially not one called Mishka Doromov." Amusement sparkled in his brown eyes at her bewilderment. "Oh, and neither does Roy, for that matter. So there's really no need for you to send that letter. Unless you're going for a diagnosis of hallucination caused by a nervous breakdown that might give you a few months off the job. In that case, go ahead."

Kate hated it when Castle talked to her with that whiff of bemused arrogance. But right now, as one of many heavy loads was taken off her mind, she almost wanted to kiss him. Almost. Instead she settled for a hug, not caring as the boxes of chocolate actually did fall on the floor, an intense, deeply grateful hug that Castle returned by putting his arms around her gently and holding on to her as if his life depended on her.

Or maybe it was the other way around. All Kate knew for certain in that moment was that he there was no one she would rather have been held by, and for now that was enough.

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_When you read this, it means I'm dead. It means it's your fault, and it means that I don't have to be afraid of you any longer. You, in turn, should be afraid._

Paul Zimmermann sighed heavily and placed the short letter on the desk in front of him with an almost gentle motion. Though it hadn't been signed, the neat handwriting and the context told him unmistakably who the sender was, and he shook his head while he whispered her name: "Oh, Lara. _Dumme, kleine Lara_."

The events of the last few days had, he might as well admit it to himself, left their marks on him. The loss of Markus Wegener and Heinz Bannert had cut pretty deep, as they had been part of only a handful of people he chose to trust. With them he had lost one of his most effective teams; it would take time to find new employees as efficient and loyal. The death of Martin and Richard Wellerby, though most unpleasant people, had cost him one of his most lucrative businesses; one he had been especially proud of establishing. And even though damage control had been executed as planned and would protect him from legal consequences, this whole story had left him in quite a vulnerable position in relation to his competitors; it was impossible to drown out each and every rumor and signs of weakness might encourage other players to enter his side of the field. The whole affair reminded him unpleasantly of the tragic (yet necessary) death of Herbert Meyer that had almost cost him his prominent position in drug dealing a few years ago. Come to think of it, hadn't it been the same cop that had caused him problems back then?

Well, Lara's letter surely didn't make this situation any better, on the contrary. Once more he skimmed the lines on the piece of paper that had been sent from a local post office yesterday. The words weren't what concerned him; they might have been an empty threat, a last desperate attempt to prove to him that she hadn't been owned by him. The photograph that had been attached to the letter on the other hand… In the wrong hands it might really cause him trouble. The question was: Had it already been sent to anyone else, anyone who might use it against him? And how did that stupid girl even get her hands on something as dangerously delicate as this?

Another discomforting thought forced its way into his mind: Maybe she had played him. Maybe she had been working undercover for the NYPD, faking economic vulnerability to get close to him and his operations. Either way, her actions left him with two possibilities: He could play it safe and leave the country; after all, he was a rich man by now and would easily be able to start a new life somewhere else. Or he could stand and fight for everything he had built since he had come to New York. He could take revenge on those meddling in his affairs and show that arrogant bitch, who only in death could muster the courage to threaten him, where she could put her letter and her so-called leverage.

The safe way certainly had its appeal. But then again… Paul Zimmermann was not known for backing off when he was pushed. He was known for pushing back.


End file.
